Undertale: The Seventh Soul
by J. W. Fox
Summary: A different take on the story of Undertale, and the tale of the seventh human to plummet from the dry & barren slums of Ebott into the mysterious world of the Underground. An array of vicious monsters, powerful enemies, and questionably timed puns awaits our intrepid and incredibly snarky protagonist. Dear god, who raised this child? *Novelization of Undertale
1. Chapter 1: Fallen Down

_Oh my aching everything._

I tried to sit up, only to have my spine screaming in protest. A forced gasp escaped my lips. It wasn't just my back. Everything was burning, from my arms and legs to my chest and neck.

My first instinct was to scream, but I barely had enough breath to form a measly, "D-dammit." I must've broken something. Or, more likely, every single bone left in my body.

My second attempt went a little bit better. I managed to sit straight up without emptying my stomach or blacking out. Not a bad start.

Now for the hard part.

I winced as I leaned forward, trying to push myself onto my feet with my hands on either side of my thighs. The pain had subsided just enough for me to stumble up, my first mistake.

Foot.

Definitely.

 _Broken._

I cried out, nearly falling backwards over myself. I might as well have planted my right foot directly on a shard of broken glass, or called over a ravenous wolf to begin viciously gnawing it off. The immense pain forced back memories of the first and only other time I had broken a bone. Way, way back when I was in Kindergarten, my friends and I had been tossing a frisbee around after school. I failed a catch, as usual, and for some reason one of them felt that the whole world would come to an end if they didn't pick it up before me. Five seconds later, they had taken a running leap and crushed my arm against the ground with their knees when I went to grab it.

Not particularly pleasant.

Back in reality, my weight automatically shifted to my left side. Luckily, that foot seemed perfectly fine. Well, luckily might have been a bit of a stretch. I felt anything _but_ lucky at that moment.

Then a thought struck me, one almost as terrifying as the situation itself.

Where the hell was I?

Just enough light bled into the room from above for me to get a good look around, not that there was much to look at. A quick 360 pivot revealed I was in a small, nearly empty chasm with thick jagged stone jutting out towards me, forming a make-shift wall. The only potential exit was a claustrophobic dirt path running further into the...cave, maybe?

Well, it was either a cave, or a really detailed movie set. No cameras, green screens, or Pitts in sight, so probably not the latter.

My eyes widened when I finally looked skyward. If I _had_ stumbled into my own Indiana Jones set, it was trying pretty damn hard to be convincing.

The light had been pouring through a gaping hole in the stone, hundreds...no, maybe _thousands_ of feet above me. Could've been twenty and I still would've been screwed, those extra thousands just added insult to injury. Had I...

...Had I survived that fall?

 _Yep, I see no possible problem with that theory, Einstein._ Even as I scolded myself, my doubts had already began to waver. How the hell else would I have ended up down here? _Obviously, I just climbed down here in the middle of the night, decided to lay down for a quick nap, and woke up with half the bones in my body shattered._ Yeah, sure, that made enough sense, at least compared to the alternative.

 _C'mon, think!_ But that was so much harder with your brain pulsating painfully every other second, as if someone were trying to drill into the side of your head. I remembered standing right on the edge of a bottomless pit, the wind howling in my ears. Night time, maybe, 'cause it was nearly pitch black and freezing cold wherever I was. A name materialized itself in my head.

Mt. Ebott.

It was famous in my town, not necessarily as a tourist attraction, but more of a folk tale we told the little kids to scare the crap out of them.

...Er, that was my reason, anyway. Parents usually spread the story around to keep their children from scrambling up the mountain and hurting themselves. Apparently, anyone who climbed it was never heard from again. So basically every generic "don't touch that!" and "don't go there!" legend ever told, only now it didn't seem like much of a fable.

All of a sudden, I started to feel really, _really_ lucky again. There's no way I had survived that fall. Unless this _was_ hell, although I was always pictured it with more face-melting flames licking at the rocks.

 _This is real. This is happening._ I didn't especially feel like standing around any longer wondering how I was still alive. What really concerned me was making sure I stayed that way. And that meant finding a means out.

There was no visible way back up the chasm I'd tumbled down, aside from trying to scale the razor-sharp rocks. Which, factoring in the height, plus my current condition of, "ouch," left me with approximately a negative five out ten chance to get out of here that way. And still no idea whether any help would arrive after that.

Another surge of pain lurched through my body, starting from my foot and rising through to my mouth to be let out in a series of ragged coughs. I was in doubtlessly more pain that I'd ever been in before. I didn't even feel strong enough to call for help. Not that anyone would be able to hear me from all the way down here, let alone know where to start looking for me. Or care enough to search at all.

"Son of a-!" I attempted a yell, and immediately regretted it. My stomach tried to stab itself as I hacked out another cough. Who knew yelling sucked so much when even breathing hurt? "Only one way out, then..." I muttered to myself, turning back towards the path carving further into the mountain. I didn't have any reason to believe it actually lead anywhere, but it wasn't like I had a ton of other options. Aside from curling up and dying, of course, but I wasn't quite that desperate yet.

Right as I began my first step, or half-shuffle, more like it, I was met with the crisp sound of leaves shifting beneath my feet. It stood out since it was pretty much the only sound I'd heard besides my grunts of excruciating pain and hollow breaths.

I glanced down, discovering it wasn't leaves, but...

...Flower petals. Unrealistically golden, luscious flower petals, somehow in full bloom despite their unfortunate living conditions. At first, I figured they had to be fake, but as I bent over to feel them with my fingertips, despite my back's protests, they definitely felt...alive. Breathing. Like all they've only ever had one major function in life; to grow taller, and were hell bent on sticking to it.

I scoffed.

Lucky bastards.

Aside from that, they felt both soft and springy, like a bed and mattress. I'd bet anything those were what broke my fall.

...And didn't show even one sign of me smashing into them. Not one dent or dead flower, even after cushioning my thousand foot fall. So either I didn't fall, or these things were freaking mutant flowers.

I limped over them carelessly. If they didn't die earlier, then nothing could kill them.

Without a cast or crutches or anything to support my limbs, I basically had to drag my injured foot along with me. Felt like someone was hammering it with every step I took, but I soldiered on. To my surprise, the path actually went somewhere. It turned off to a separate hallway lined with...shaped marble columns! Finally, a sign of intelligent life, or at least life good enough with their hands to function properly. Maybe I wasn't alone down here. Maybe all of those bullshit stories surrounding Mt. Ebott were just that; bullshit stories.

I stumbled into a dimly lit claustrophobic room with a chilly atmosphere hanging over it like a thick fog. The only thing in sight was a lonely looking flower with golden pedals lining it's ashen head.

My pained groans ground against he stone, echoing off the dusty cavern. Stumbling again, I threw a hand against the wall to hold myself up. It was so impossible to keep moving. With no help in sight and my oh-so-fiery charisma slowly dying, I figured there wasn't much time left before-

"Howdy!"

My body reacted before my mind could. I spun towards the voice and leapt away from it and the wall at the same time, landing on my injured foot and sending waves of agony rippling up my leg. It was all I could do to keep from passing out as I crumpled to the floor.

"Oh, sorry, did I scare you?"

My vision was going dark around the edges. I tried to locate the source of the sound, but the only thing in here was that damned flower...

Wait...

I mentally slapped myself.

The flower had a face.

And it was frowning at me.

"Are you hurt?" it asked, eyeing my pathetic form up and down. Its mouth curled in time with each word that resonated through the room.

"I dunno, do I look like it?" I grunted sarcastically.

It narrowed its eyes. "It's kind of hard to tell...could you stand up so I can get a better look?"

I honestly couldn't tell if it was sarcasm, or if I was on the verge of death talking to a dim-witted wannabe sunflower.

"No." I spat. Had I hit my head when I fell? Maybe this was just some bizarre hallucination. Or I was already dead and I had been right in assuming this was hell.

"Hold on, I think I can heal you."

Think?

"Well, if you're gonna do it, now would be good!" I yelled, my lungs screaming in protest.

Suddenly, the pain subsided, flowing out of my body in a river of relief. Whatever that flower had done, it'd done it well.

My muscles were still a bit stiff, but I climbed to my feet regardless, hugging the wall for support. I flexed my foot out and back just to make sure it worked again.

"Finally." I said, turning my attention back to the talking flower. His frown had been replaced by a huge ear-to-ear grin (or petal to petal, I guess), and his eyes flickered with light.

And without the pain to distract me anymore, I realized the absurdity of my situation. I'd survived a well over a thousand foot fall, granted with major injuries, stumbled into a pitch-black cavern, and got magically restored to normal by an animate flower.

Animate. Freaking. Flower.

Forget hell, this was far worse. Far, _far_ worse. I might as well have stumbled into a cruel retelling of Alice in Wonderland.

"So, uh, you're a...figment of my dying imagination, right?" I asked casually, as if I'd been asking my neighbor if I could borrow some sugar.

It shook it's head softly. Which, for him, basically meant violently swaying his whole body.

"Sorry, it was rude of me not to introduce myself right away, but I got distracted when you fell over..." it apologized in a high-pitched sing-song voice you might hear from a children's cartoon. Or those annoying little girl characters in every anime ever. I'd only ever heard bits and pieces, but...come on, I was right. "I'm Flowey! Flowey the flower!"

I smiled. My patience was...already wearing thin with this one. "Flowey, huh? Creative name."

"I know, right!? I thought of it myself!" he stated proudly.

What a tool.

"You know where this is, golden & gray?"

It took him a moment to ponder my question, or to realize I was still referring to him. "Hmm...you're new to the Underground, aren'tcha?"

I frowned, jamming my hands in my pockets. I had prepared some stupid witty comeback, but scrapped it, figuring it would just go right over his head. "Yeah."

"Golly, you must be so confused. Someone ought to teach you how things work around here!"

My posture stiffened instinctively. I didn't like the sound of that.

"I guess little old me will have to do."

Definitely did _not_ like the sound of that.

"Uh, hold on there short stuff..." I protested.

"Ready!?" It blurted out. "Here we go!"

Oh god.

At first, nothing seemed to happen. I anxiously stared at the ground, waiting for some kind of giant vine-of-death to pop up and skewer me like a kebab.

"See that heart?"

Now that he'd pointed it out, I couldn't believed I'd missed it in the first place. An eight-bit scarlet heart had sprouted out from my chest where my actual heart would've been.

Okay, new theory. If I wasn't dead, and I wasn't dreaming (and this sure as hell didn't feel like a dream) then someone must have slipped LSD in my whatever-the-hell I had last to eat. I probably stumbled to the mountain in a state of confusion and tumbled on down here, and now I was having those flashbacks.

Then again, why did it all feel so real...

"That is your SOUL, the very culmination of your being!"

"...Culmination? Fancy word there, Flowey." I said.

"Thanks!"

Alright, if this explanation didn't end in another thirty seconds, I was bailing. I couldn't stand it when my insults went ignored, it felt way worse than getting one back in return. 'Cause at least then, I knew I'd struck a nerve.

"Anyways, your SOUL starts off weak, but can grow strong if you gain a lot of LV."

"What's LV stand for?" he continued, apparently reading my 'what the hell are you babbling on about' expression. "Why, LOVE, of course! You want some LOVE, don't you?"

Something about his emphasis on the word 'love' rubbed me the wrong way. Even if it meant what I'd been brought up to believe, tampering with love wasn't exactly something I did too often. Especially with retarded flowers.

"Nah, I'm...I'm good." I murmured, shifting towards an opening on the opposite end of the room.

He gave me a quizzical look. A very, very, _very_ unsettling quizzical look. "Really? C'mon, let me share some with you!" He stuck his tongue out at me and winked, sending a white speck of pollen flying across through the air. I continued nonchalantly half-stepping towards my means of escape, or at least away from his ear-bleedingly obnoxious voice. I'd rather shove a fork in my ear than listen to him anymore.

"Down here, love is shared through... Little white...'friendliness pellets.'"

Aaaaaaand that was my cue. Any 'white pellets' Flowey was sharing weren't anything I'd be touching anytime soon. "Yeah...you can keep your 'friendliness pellets' to yourself." I muttered. Aside from being...incredibly disturbing, none of his explanation was making any sense. 'Gaining love' through absorbing 'friendliness pellets' made about as much sense as stuffing your face to get better at cooking.

For Christ's sake, who the hell planted this flower in a dark, isolated cavern anyways? Was it literally only to get the flower out of their hair?

"Oh, _trust_ me, you want as many of these things as you can get!" Flowey exclaimed. Was he rolling his eyes? "Here!"

Before I could protest again, Flowey launched his pellets in my direction. I sighed, not defeated, but just...well, done with Flowey's shit. Maybe it would be easier just to accept his incredibly creepy gift. If it would get him off my back sooner...

I cupped my hand out to grab at the first one to near me. It hovered in front of my face, gently shifting side to side as it fluttered to the ground, like a snow flake-

"AH!"

My spine snapped with a stomach-churning _crunch_ as I was thrown against the wall. I gasped, crumpling to the floor like a rag doll, signals flying every which way in my head trying to figure out what the hell had just happened.

Shrill, sinister laughter echoed through the room, screeching into my ears, taunting me. I rolled my head over to try to locate the sound, fighting the urge to lose consciousness. It was hard to tell through my blurred vision, but Flowey's face had completely transformed.

His mouth was lined with razor-sharp teeth like barbed wire, and he was cackling hysterically, as if I was the funniest thing in the world to him.

"You _idiot_ ," he whispered, gazing menacingly at me.

That's when it hit me. I had been tricked.

By a freaking flower.

"In this world, it's kill or be killed," he continued. I tried to say something, but all that came out of my mouth was the gurgling of blood and a few croaks.

"Why would _anyone_ pass up an opportunity like this?"

I couldn't even muster a come-back. My mind was losing the battle to keep consciousness. The remnants of my adrenaline fought to keep the pain from coursing through my body, but failed. I was at the mercy of my killer.

 _I_ was the tool.

Another stream of those hellish white pellets surrounded me, cutting off my already nonexistent escape path.

There was no emotion to Flowey's voice as he spoke again. "Die."

The pellets were closing in. I closed my eyes, losing myself in the malice of Flowey's demonic laugh.

Goddammit, this wasn't how it was supposed it was supposed to end. I counted down to my final moments. Three...

Two...

One...

...

...?

 _...Wow, those pellets sure are taking their damn time._

My eyes fluttered open again. If I could move, I would've shot up in surprise. The bullets had vanished into thin air.

The devil-flower had returned to his semi-normal state, a confused scowl plastered on his face.

"Huh? Why are you not _dead_?"

As if on cue, a bright red fireball came blasting out of the wall, knocking Flowey across the room. Under different circumstances, I would've been confused and scared out of my mind, but everything felt so agonizingly sluggish and distant. A dream.

Now it _really_ felt like a dream.

Footsteps padded over in my direction. Next thing I knew, I was staring at two over-sized furry white feet and the bottom of what looked like some kind of skirt.

"What a terrible creature, torturing such a poor, innocent youth..."

That was the last thing I heard before blacking out.


	2. Chapter 2: Goat Mom

Ebott was a dry, bleak little city so flat & uninteresting you could watch the cars speed down the highway for hours before they'd finally disappear. If you took the entirety of the Sahara's dry barrenness, mixed it in with a little of Chicago's crime rate and pollution, and squished it all together into one town, you'd pretty much get Ebott. Aside from the mountain, of course, but even that was less than spectacular. Besides, it's kind of pathetic when you realize the defining characteristics of your city are the consistency of crippling debt, chipped paint & cracks on every single building, and a pile of rocks looming over you that block out eighty percent of the sunlight for at least the latter half of the day. "Ebott sunset" we called it, as if giving it a name would make it any less infuriating.

Sometimes the worst thing you could do was try and look at what lie beyond the city, which was always accompanied by a grim reminder that there really was nothing, save for the miles and miles of chipped earth the color of rust.

All of that pretty much sums up why the moment I finally regained consciousness and found myself not only free of any physical pain, but also surrounded by the fullest crimson leaves I'd ever seen in my life, I nearly fainted again.

At first, I was skeptical. As skeptical as someone who'd had just groggily woken up with drool sliding down their face could be, anyway. My mind still hadn't fully come to terms with the fact that the things I'd seen down here were real. It felt more like I had escaped from one dream and fallen right back into another.

Not to mention the last time I'd been miraculously healed after a life-threatening injury resulted in a round of good old-fashioned attempted murder by use of friendliness pellets.

That damn Flower. That damn, _damn_ flower! What kind _of...abomination_ would go through the trouble of helping someone out and gaining their trust just to kill them moments later? He could've just as easily finished me off the second I came limping up to him on the verge of death. He was like a cat, torturing and playing with whatever prey he caught instead of granting them the dignity of a swift death.

Still, I guess it _had_ worked out in my favor, in a way. I was still alive and kicking, and thanks to him, I had way more information about this world than I would've if he'd never shown up in the first place.

Maybe we were _both_ tools.

Even as my thoughts cleared, I still found myself reluctant to get up. My head rested on something...soft and cozy. Like, unnaturally soft and cozy. I hadn't slept on a bed this comfortable since...

...Ever, actually. Usually the best I had was an old tattered mattress and a rigid bed frame. Or, on nights where I felt like being pissy and arguing, a miserable park bench. Which, surprisingly, wasn't much worse.

I guess you could say I sort of lost myself in the moment. The leaves, the comfort, and the gentle sound of trickling water in the distance all worked together in this weird gravitational pull to keep me in place. It felt like nirvana after what I'd been through.

Maybe It wouldn't be so bad to lay there...

...for just a little while longer...

...

...

My eyes shot open. Something was shifting around under my head.

I rolled over until I was staring straight up. I hadn't been laying on a bed or pillow.

The talking flower, without a doubt, _easily,_ had been the strangest thing I'd ever seen, but the anthropomorphic goat took not only the cake, but the whole damn bakery.

And I had been laying on her lap.

"Ah, you're awake," it said in a cordial woman's voice, a bright smile on its face.

"SHIT!"

I leaped to my feet and sprinted as far away as I could, the crunching of leaves following my footsteps, which turned out to be a grand total of about three feet. I found myself wedged into a small corner, no real method of escape in sight.

The creature yelped in surprise and sprang to her feet.

"D-don't be afraid, my child," she stammered. "I didn't mean to frighten you-"

"-Stay back!" I said, trying to make my voice as intimidating possible. I quickly scanned the ground for a weapon, or anything to defend myself with. I settled on nature's deadliest creation; a two foot long stick.

Did I say nature's deadliest creation? I meant the _worst_ thing ever.

"Stay back," I repeated. "I have a stick!" Yep, no way to make _that_ sound menacing.

It seemed unfazed by my threats. As if that was a shock. "I have no intention of harming you," it said calmly, hands poised neatly in front of her. "My name is Toriel."

I didn't lower my guard. Not for a second. I'd learned my lesson from before, even if my supposed attacker had the guise of a sweet old lady.

'Toriel' possessed the typical appearance you might expect from any woman barely old enough to be a grandmother. You know, aside from the whole...goat, thing. Gentle features peppered with wrinkles, warm friendly smile, soft eyes worn from years of experience...horns, long white floppy ears covered in fur...

"Is something wrong, my child? You look like you've seen a ghost."

I felt frozen in place. What _wasn't_ wrong? Did she honestly just expect me to accept this incredibly bizarre world as a reality?

 _In this world, it's kill or be killed,_ Flowey's words echoed in my ears.

My grip on the stick tightened. I could feel the rough bark digging into my skin. The sooner I accepted that I was basically a soldier lost behind enemy lines, the better chances I had of surviving. Part of me was ready to lash out against Toriel, and that feeling got stronger and stronger every second she stood in front of me.

Toriel's eyes widened. "Oh, of course you'd be confused..." she chastised herself, literally face-palming. Or, snout palming, I guess. "Please forgive me, it's been a very long time since another human has come here."

My heart leapt. "There are others?" I asked, dubious. If she were telling the truth, and I weren't the only person to ever come here, then all the legends surrounding Mt. Ebott were more than just legends. Something, _anything_ familiar would be comforting right about now, anyways, even if they were total strangers.

Huh...I could practically taste the irony in that.

She sent me an apologetic smile. "Yes, but they have long since moved on from the Ruins..." she trailed off, all without meeting my gaze.

I felt my eyes shooting daggers at her. "Okay, if you want me to trust you, we need to get a few things straight," I began. Toriel snapped her attention back to me. "First of all, don't dance around my questions. And if I catch you lying, I won't think _twice_ about shoving this stick up your...places." It was an empty threat, really. The biggest thing I'd ever killed was probably a cockroach. "Second of all, cut it out with the 'my child' shit. I'm fifteen," I proudly proclaimed.

Toriel seemed to be absorbing my words carefully.

My mind finally caught up to speed since waking up, then kicked into overdrive. The last thing I'd seen before blacking out were a pair of feet that matched her's perfectly, which probably meant that sweet little Tori here had summoned that fireball and saved my ass from that flower. And if I'd pissed her off, there's no telling why she couldn't conjure it again.

When she opened her mouth to speak again, I nearly panicked and lunged at her. But the fear of being turned to cinder kept me in place.

 _Kill or be killed._

"I realize that you must be scared. And I don't know what that scoundrel flower said to you before I got there..." She bent down enough so she was eye-level to me. "But I can promise you, as long as you are within my care, no harm will come to you." Then she extended her hand.

I swear I stood there staring at it for centuries. She spoke with enough confidence that I knew her words were sincere. It sounded vaguely...motherly, I guess, although outside of my matron no one _ever_ used that tone with me. Without getting decked in the face, that is.

When I was young, I taught myself never to put too much trust in any one person. It was one of the first rules you learn in cities like Ebott. That and "everyone sucks," which really go hand in hand. Flowey proved that himself. But Tori might be my best chance at survival for now, and she gave me no reason to believe she wanted me dead.

Before I knew what was happening, my hand was enveloped by hers in a tender handshake. My uncertainty abated when she grinned at me. A smile that bright could've ended World War II. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," I said snottily. I finally let my stick-wielding arm dangle by my side. It'd grown so stiff the stick felt more like an arm-extension then anything.

She chuckled, "You have quite the sense of humor there...oh." She looked at my quizzically. "Forgive me, what should I call you?"

She liked my 'sense of humor,' huh? Maybe she'd like a little more.

"Jeez lady, you're asking for a lot of forgiveness..." I muttered, shuffling from foot to foot. "Not sure I have that much." For that little extra comedic effect, I turned over my pockets. Nothing but a few crumpled up pieces of lint tumbled out. "Yep, fresh out." I quickly tucked them back in and changed the subject before she could reply. "So, you mentioned something about 'The Ruins'?"

"Right, forgive me-" she cut herself off mid sentence. Her lips pursed. "Never mind. Follow me, I'll guide you through the Ruins, young one." With that, she spun around swiftly on her heels and marched off.

"H-hey, wait up!" I cried, charging after her. Her feet padded up the right most of a pair of smoothed stone staircases, taking two steps at a time.

"I am the caretaker of the Ruins," she called over her shoulder. "I pass through here everyday to see if anyone has fallen down." I ducked after her through a small opening in the wall.

"Really? You must have a hell of a lot of time on your hands then..." I murmured. Toriel already walked briskly, the fact that she towered at least two feet over me made it even harder to keep up. Her strides were the equivalent of my jogging speed.

"You'd be surprised," she chided. "There's quite a lot I have to get done everyday."

"I'll believe it when I see it." As much as I teased her, Tori hadn't done anything to majorly piss me off. Yet. Everyone always managed to find a way, and Tori's unwavering kindness could turn from a blessing to burden _real_ quick.

We came to an abrupt halt in the next room. Toriel was planted in front of a set of double doors, beaming at me like a six-year old who managed to stay up on their big boy bike for more than five seconds. "Welcome to your new home, innocent one!" she bellowed, enthusiastically gesturing behind her with her massive arms (compared to mine, anyways.)

Apparently my response of an openly blank stare caught her off guard. "Er...what's wrong?" she asked.

A lot, actually. For starters, 'innocent one' was about as bad as 'my child' for a nickname. And judging by this room alone, the Ruins would be about as good a living place as Ebott.

Which wasn't saying much.

While it wasn't nearly as dark as I'd expect the, ya know, _Underground_ to be, the walls, despite seeming to be carved from stone, were a really out of place lavender color, which went to war with the natural worn out and crack-ridden look that stone naturally developed over time, and this place looked _ancient._ As a caretaker, Tori was doing one hell of an awful job. 'Course the lack of any furniture kind of sucked, too.

Believe it or not, though, I didn't feel like arguing with and/or being showered in Toriel's unwavering sympathy. When I finally gathered my words, I gave her the easy answer. "...Nothing."

"Good, you had me going there for a second," she said, not bothering to try and hide her sharp breath of relief. "As I was saying," she continued, clearing her throat and flattening her dress like a school teacher. "Allow me to educate you in the operation of the Ruins." With that, she sped over a few switches protruding from the ground, flattening them, and finally pulled a lever hanging on the wall.

At first, nothing happened, aside from my brain cells popping. Then the double doors lurched open, clanging against the wall with enough force to send chunks of rubble flying towards my unsuspecting face.

I straight-up shrieked at the top of my lungs, suddenly unable to process jack-shit. Good thing my limbs usually work before my mind does.

I ducked the debris milliseconds before it connected with my skull. It was still close enough for me to feel it whizzing through my hair at the speed of whoa. The projectile rocketed into the wall behind me, shattering and sending shrapnel ricocheting. None of it was large enough to do any major damage, but it definitely stung as the bullets pelted my back.

Mr. Brain finally decided to rejoin the party after the echo died down and all the dust settled. I glanced back at Toriel, who must have been even more shaken up than I was. She stood dumbstruck and stock-still right where she'd been the moment she pulled the lever. Thank God none of the wreckage had flown her way, or she'd have been freaking obliterated.

"Tori, you okay?" I hailed, my voice still wavering. At the sound of my voice, she seemingly snapped back to reality.

"Are you unharmed?!" She wailed, sprinting towards me, crouching down, and throwing her arms around me all in the span of about one second.

"D-yes, I'm fine!" I struggled. Damn, she had the grip of a wrestler.

"I'm so sorry! Nothing like this has ever happened before, oh I've failed to protect you _already_..." She went on and on and on about how she fumbled her responsibilities and should be a better guardian and blah, blah blah blah _blah,_ blah. I would've respected her dedication, if her strangle-hold of an embrace wasn't making the bruises on my back sting even harder.

"Tori, seriously, I'm all right!" I pleaded. "Do I look hurt to you?" She immediately went to scan the entire front-half of my body for _any_ sort of injury whatsoever, and thankfully found none. "See?" I asked as her observation came to a halt. Without answering, she slid over to me and raised her sleeve to the side of my face.

Of all the things she could've done at the moment, she was honestly trying to wipe the dried saliva still sticking to my face from when I woke up.

"S-stop, I'll get it myself-"

"-No, hold on...just let me-" We grappled for a minute over who got the privilege of swabbing my face. Three hours later and I managed to force her off me long enough to wipe it on my sleeve.

"Jeez, happy!?" I demanded.

Her eyes sunk towards the ground. "I know I can be a bit of a worrywart, but I'm doing my best to look out for you..." she said quietly.

Great. Way to make me feel bad. Still, I don't think I could place the last time someone had been genuinely concerned with me. And the sooner she cheered up the sooner we could get moving, so...

"Hey, remember I'm fresh out of forgiveness...but I guess I can spare an apology or two..." I finished with a smirk.

As if today hadn't been surprising enough, Toriel burst out laughing. Like, hardcore, "holy-shit I'm going to die that was so funny" laughter. It filled up the emptiness of the room, and if they'd been listening closely enough, people probably could've heard it back on the surface. "Okay, calm down, it wasn't that funny...plus I think you spit in my eye."

She climbed back to her feet and attempted to regain her composure. "He he...ha...I think you might just be the second funniest person I've ever met."

I raised an eyebrow. "Who's the first?" It was hard to tell through her fur, but...was she blushing?

"Anyway, as you could see back there..." she gestured to the pile of scrap that was a doorway. Seriously, even the heavy iron doors themselves lay in a cluttered heap against stacks of crumbled stone. I think there was just enough room for us too squeeze in, but it would be a tight fit. Especially for her. "...The Ruins are filled with puzzles. Ancient fusions between diversions and doorkeys." Her voice had retained it's odd mix of friendliness and wisdom, although part of me was annoyed she'd reiterated back to dodging questions as well. "One must solve them to move from room to room."

"Like The Legend of Zelda?" I chimed in.

"Sure, but it's a secret to everybody," she replied. "Please adjust yourself to the sight these kinds of puzzles."

Before I had to chance to ask whether or not that was a reference, she climbed through the wreckage that was a doorway and continued on.

"For someone who claims to be a guardian, she sure does a piss-poor job of waiting up for people..." I muttered to myself. Just as I prepped myself to take a running leap over the carnage, I caught a glimpse of something just out the corner of the eye.

Honestly, I was surprised I missed it at first. A marble plaque clung to the wall right next to the ruined doorway, proudly watching over the rest of the room, as if it believed itself to be the guardian instead of Tori. Curious, I meandered over to it. The plaque may have very well been older than the room itself just judging by how fading the inscription had become. I practically had to press my nose against it just to make the writing out.

 **Only the fearless may proceed.**

 **Brave ones, foolish ones, both walk not the middle road.**

Normally I would have just ignored it, but...

...why did those words send shivers up my spine?

"Brave ones, foolish ones, both walk not the middle road..." I read again, aloud this time. I absentmindedly ran my hand along it's chiseled surface, chilling my fingertips to the bone. Where had I heard that before? I knew that quote. Had it memorized, even. I felt the answer prickling in the back of my mind, lodged between a rock and a hard place, nagging at me.

 _Only the fearless may proceed..._

 _In this world, it's kill or be killed..._

All of a sudden, I didn't feel so welcome down here anymore.

"Are you coming, My Chi- I mean, young one?" Came Tori's call.

I shook my head. There were better things to be worrying about other than quotes from however-many-generations ago. Like food, for example. My stomach grumbled at just the thought alone. How long had it been since I last ate or drank anything? Hours, at the least...maybe a day at the most.

"On my way, Tori!" I yelled back. With that, I pretended to forget about the plaque's strange words and jumped through the doorway.


	3. Chapter 3: Enemy Approaching

"...Seriously, all I did was pull a lever. I'm not four, Tori, you don't have to pretend _everything_ I do impresses you," I complained in a completely respectful tone without a hint of sarcasm. At all.

"I only said you were a fast learner!" she said defensively.

"I mean, you're not _wrong,_ but..."

I impatiently tapped my foot, leaning against the wall wearing my usual scowl on my face, angrily wondering aloud why I had to be educated on the time-honored art of pulling a lever. "Just because the last switch you threw freaked the hell out doesn't mean every single lever is suddenly a death trap," I snapped.

Tori sighed, tilting her head to avoid my glare. "I suppose you're right, my chi- I mean, young one, although I made those hints long before you arrived here," she said solemnly.

"I wouldn't exactly call those 'hints.'"

Not even five minutes and only one room after Tori nearly squashed me with a door and somehow we'd already ended up arguing over nothing. From what I'd seen so far, the Ruins were filled to the brim with puzzles that an autistic second grader could solve in under two seconds. Which, to Toriel, meant that even Einstein couldn't complete them without her gracious assistance.

The room was long and thin, with a light chill blowing through now and again, sending goosebumps up my arms. Thick forest-green vines wildly clawed at the cracks lining the walls, adding to the ancient vibe I was already gathering from this place. Even the aqueducts running beside me were old and sluggish, partially clogged by the vines' rejected leaves turned a muddy brown. Judging by what I'd seen so far, Tori was pretty shit at her job of 'caretaker.' But even _I_ wasn't enough of an asshole to say that to her face.

Now, complaining about her treating me like I was three, _that_ i could do.

The path forward was blocked a row of razor-sharp spikes. God, I can imagine the conversation that went on between the dolts that thought _that_ was a good addition to the decor of this place. "Ey, Blumesworth, this room's looking fabulous, absolutely fabulous, but what if...we added a set of giant-ass spikes _riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight..._ there!"

"Brilliant idea, Charles old chap, we'll get right on it."

Naturally, the only way to clear them was to pull a few levers. Apparently Toriel thought a lever-pulling puzzle was _way_ too complicated for us simple-minded humans, so she wrote, "Please press this switch," next to each one in big bold yellow letters with arrows uselessly pointing the lever beside it. She even hung a fake picture of one at the far end of the room in a feeble attempt of actually challenging anyone.

And because I was so impossibly charming, I blew up at her for it.

"Very well, I promise I'll provide absolutely _no_ assistance to any puzzle from now on, okay?" she swore, bending down so we were at equal eye-level.

I nodded and pushed off the wall. "Good." Figuring I won the argument, I stomped across the planks of wood bridging across the aqueducts, throwing the last switch without even glancing at it and tearing the fake lever off the wall for good measure. The spikes retracted right on cue, and we continued on to the next room.

The though of ditching Tori and finding my own way through the ruins crossed my mind. It'd sure as hell save me a lot of useless information and pointless explanations, and (if you couldn't guess by now) I wasn't exactly one for travel partners. Or help from another living being of any kind. As far as I was concerned, there were three kinds of people in this world: those that were useless, those that were annoying, or if you were _really_ lucky, you might just find a combination of both. So far, Toriel was definitely fitting into my 'annoying' category smoothly.

On the other hand...there's a _tiny_ chance that rushing forward blindly in unfamiliar territory _might_ be _slightly_ more dangerous than getting the help of someone who knows the place inside and out. Especially a friendly goat-lady with the ability to summon giant fireballs at will, with the added bonus of being able to put up with my bullshit. Very, _very_ few people possessed that talent. Hell, even I would've left myself to rot in the Ruins by now, and she even went as far as to save my life. So maybe sticking it out with her a little longer couldn't hurt too much.

 _It could always be worse,_ I told myself. _She could've been a combination._

"Hold on a moment, my child-oh, darn it!" Toriel called after me. She quickly cut me off and planted her feet in front of the room's exit, her brow furrowed. I couldn't figure why, since the room was about the size of my attention span with the only object of interest a worn out training dummy sitting against the far wall.

"What's the hold-up, _my child?"_ I hissed, twirling my weapon of choice, the almighty stick, in my right hand, trying desperately to pretend it was a katana or something akin to an actual weapon.

Tori giggled. "I appreciate the complement, but I haven't been a child in a long time."

Was this woman physically unable to detect sarcasm? "Could've fooled me," I muttered.

She cleared her throat. "As a human living in the Underground, monsters may attack you."

 _Oh, that's why._

"Yeah, I kinda figured that much out back with the killer sunflower." As much as I tried to play it off, something about being relentlessly hunted by killer monsters disturbed me. _Besides_ the part about being relentlessly hunted by killer monsters.

...Monsters living in the Underground...

...Where had I heard that before?

"Any particular reason they want my head? Aside from it looking great on their mantles, of course," I said smugly.

Tori clicked her tongue and lowered her voice to barely above a whisper. "Well, it's quite a long story, young one. If you don't mind, I'd rather wait until we're somewhere safer before discussing that," she said distantly, and without a hint of worry in her voice, filling me in on how that wasn't _at all_ the reason she wasn't telling me. I let her keep talking though, just because I knew opening my big mouth again would only slow us down. "Needless to say, you will need to be prepared to defend yourself. However, worry not!" She put on a bright smile in an attempt to snuff out my nonexistent concern. "The process is quite simple."

Tori curled her hands at the front of her robe and blinked, fixing her posture. When she spoke again, she used the same tone as your typical history teacher, except somehow sounding even more disinterested. "When you encounter a monster, you will enter a fight."

I raised an eyebrow. "Right, and then I smack 'em around with this a couple times," I interrupted, swinging at the air in front of me as if I was an old lady living at a retirement home, and it had just interrupted my frigging' Saturday morning bingo game. I had next to no experience with any weapon, be it sword or stick, of any kind, but I figured I could still do some damage as long as I swung it hard enou-

"-No, no, of course not!" Tori chastised. I whipped my head around, shooting her my patented _'what the hell did you just say to me'_ look.

"Pardon?"

Tori lost any and all professionalism in her posture. She shifted from foot to foot, back and forth, ear twitching uncomfortably. Apparently my one comment had utterly destroyed her confidence. "We don't want to hurt anyone, do we...?"

 _That_ caught me off guard, like a sucker punch to the large intestine. She could've said, "injuring monsters will cause giant mutant camels to fly down to the heavens to impregnate you with the child of the sun," and I would've come out less confused.

"Strike up a friendly conversation," she continued, unphased by my dumbfounded expression. "I will come to resolve the conflict."

I couldn't begin to wrap my head around that. The last time I tried to get chummy, or rather, avoid getting chummy with one of the Underground's inhabitants didn't end so well. Hell, Tori had been there to see it. I'd made no move showing any hostility towards that damn, _damn_ hell spawn of a flower, and what did he do? Stab me in the back. Same as usual.

And now she was asking me to do it all over again.

"Are you alright, young one?" Tori fretted, kneeling down besides me. She did her best to comfort me without getting too close, although I honestly wouldn't have even noticed at the time.

 _Kill or be killed._ _We wouldn't want to hurt anyone._ The words fired at and clashed with each other, an all-out war all taking place on a battlefield in my brain. Or as Flowey would've corrected me, my soul.

"...As always, I'm fine," I said as calmly as possible.

Tori visibly lit up. "Splendid," she sang, clearly delighted I hadn't retorted or snapped at her with some cheep throw-away insult for once. She sprang to her feet and gestured to the pathetic training dummy sitting in the corner. "Perhaps you'd like to practice on this dummy?"

Good thing there was eternally enough Tori naivety to pull me back to reality. I crossed my arms and looked at her with my eyes hanging half-open accusatory. "You did _not_ just as me to 'strike up a friendly conversation' with a training dummy."

"Oh, it's really quite simple," she assured. "If you want, I could tell you one of my favorite ice-breaker jokes."

 _Oh, this oughta be good._ "Shoot," I encouraged.

Tori seemed to be brimming with excitement at the thought of sharing one of her jokes with me. She had this weird spark in her eye that I swear hadn't been there before. "What does a skeleton pave his roof with?"

"Gee, I wonder."

" _Shin_ -gles!" she said, ecstatic.

I gave what was the only plausible response for a joke of that quality; a completely emotionless, blank stare of utter disbelief.

Tori didn't let that slow her down. "Oh come on, have a _heart!"_ she exclaimed, furiously pointing at my chest.

That one at least earned a reaction, although it probably couldn't have been farther from humorous. I glanced down, my eyes immediately catching the bright red heart protruding from my rib cage. My "soul." I'd honestly forgotten about it with all the...lets call it, "excitement," going on since I'd woken up in the Underground. So far it hadn't done much but sat there and contemplate its life choices in its free time, and even now it still seemed pretty insignificant. The very culmination of my being was pretty boring, to be honest.

Toriel recoiled harshly when I ignored her joke. "Well, I found it amusing..." she muttered. "How about-"

"-No!" I jolted back to attention. "Nope, I'm good, ready to have a long philosophical encounter with a training dummy," I interrupted, pushing past her and lining up face-to-face with my...opponent, I guess.

The training dummy was worn, sullen, and falling apart at the seems as if it'd been standing here since the beginning of time. Just smacking and taking this thing out would probably be a bigger kindness than anything I could ever come up with to say to it. But pissing off Tori would only serve to backfire on me, so I locked "eyes" with it, which were really just a pair stitches marked in an X shape, and played my ultimate conversation-starter trump card.

"How ya doing?" I asked. The dummy didn't respond.

Shocker.

"Seen any good movies lately?" Again, no response. It, surprisingly, didn't seem much for conversation. "All right, Phil, see ya around."

Feeling about as comfortable as a fly caged in a Venus fly trap, I turned back toward the exit to find Tori beaming at me. "Ah. Very good, you are very good..." she trailed off, talking more to herself than me. Then she disappeared into the next room without another word.

But could I do the same against the actual threats, the monsters lurking in the Ruins? If they turned out to all be hell-spawns like Flowey, there was a fart's chance in the wind I could actually talk them into letting me go. And while I acted like I could handle myself, which I could, I hadn't really seen my fair share of fights, at least by city kid standards. My mind instinctively jumped to the worst case scenario, filling up the empty halls of the Ruins with images of giant killer insects or some kind of ancient Greek monsters, as well as some of my own abominations I could take several haunting hours to describe.

Then again...if someone as sweet as Toriel was asking me to put myself at further risk just to avoid hurting them, then they couldn't be all _that_ bad. Or, if I could kill them with a stick, at least not very tough.

For what seemed like the millionth time, I drifted back to my first encounter with Flowey. This time, though, I used his cruel words to motivate me.

I narrowed my eyes and hopped up on the balls of my feet, charging after Toriel. I'd prove that flower wrong. I was determined to make it out of here alive without harming, or at least killing, a single soul. _Even if_ they were combinations.

...Of course, my foot promptly caught on something with perfect comedic timing, and I tripped, nearly tumbling face-fist into the ground.

Reacting quickly to my own stupidity, I tossed the stick out my hand and used my momentum to shoulder-roll back onto my feet, the only pain coming from the preexisting bruises spread across my back. I should've asked Toriel to heal those for me, but it was too late now.

I scrambled to grab hold of my almighty stick once again, simultaneously checking to see what my foot had snagged on.

What I found nearly made me burst out laughing.

Sitting just besides the doorway I'd entered from was a snow white frog-like creature about as tall as my shins, clutching it's head with both stubby arms right where I assumed I had kicked it. Other than it's shape, though, I couldn't immediately pin any other similarities between it and regular frogs.

...Or any other living being. The thing stared blankly at me with eyes completely devoid of emotion, let alone pupils, practically unmoving, like a stuffed animal. It might've actually creeped me out if I hadn't been actively preparing myself for the worst.

I was about to write it off as something I could ignore entirely, until it let out a hearty "Ribbit!" and leaped straight at me. It's assault caught me completely off guard, sending us toppling over one another on the hard stone floor. My elbow bashed the ground, sending shivers of pain rattling up my bones.

I cried out angrily, wildly flailing my other arm in an attempt to fling the thing off me. Thankfully, my uninjured arm was the stick-wielding one. I smacked at the frog repeatedly with the "hilt" of the stick. Surprisingly, it only took a couple blows to its head before it hopped off, repositioning itself further away from me with another, now saddened "Ribbit!"

I painstakingly rose to my feet, clutching my injured elbow with my good arm. I examined it as quickly as possible in fear of another sneak-attack. My skin where I had landed was already a deep shade of black and blue, and needless to say, it hurt like hell. I didn't have to be a medical expert to tell I'd fractured something. Easily.

Any courage I'd built up over the past couple of minutes was replaced by blind rage. Boiling blood rushed to my face. I think it was about time this overgrown amphibian learned a thing or two about mankind.

"You just messed with the wrong human," I yelled in true action-movie-hero fashion. The beast responded by letting loose a swarm of equally white flies from its mouth.

Gross.

They snaked towards me in varying patterns in an attempt to cut off any means of evasion. Little did they know, they sucked at it. For the first wave, all I did was lean to the right and the insects sped right past my head without even veering off course in the slightest. In the split second they were right in front of my face, I noticed they weren't even really flies, so much as little white specks with the outline of wings.

Little white..."friendliness pellets?" Did everything down here attack with those?

Whatever, no time to wonder about the questionable battle tactics of glorified toads. The rest of its attack was actually on target, albeit with plenty of room to dodge. I vaulted over a few and flipped over in mid air to land hands-down to the floor, then pushing off and springing over the last wave of them and back onto my feet, only stumbling in the slightest. Although I owe that entirely to holding on to the stick the whole time. And maybe the giant bruise on my elbow that, if not for the adrenaline, would be killing me right about now.

It took me a second a few breaths to gather to gather myself. When I glanced forward, I found the frog had somehow already backed itself into a corner without me even lifting a finger at it, stuck between a hard place and another hard place. It trembled and shook in fear, apparently fresh out of ideas already. With a frown of disgust, I noticed it's actual eyes were stuck on a dangling black sack that closely resembled...actually, never mind.

"Scared, froggy?" I taunted, twirling my weapon around like a baton. Then, as I narrowed my eyes, "'Cause you should be."

Just as I was about to lunge forward and bring the pain, however, I felt something firm grasp my shoulder from behind, holding me back. I spun around, wincing when I found Toriel's gaze sweeping back and forth between me and the frog, a disapproving glare in her eyes and a tightly knit scowl as if she'd caught two schoolboys fighting at recess.

For some reason, I completely locked up. There was something in the way she eyed me in combination with the hold she had on me that denied any sort of resistance. And for reasons I couldn't explain, that annoyed me beyond comprehension.

Without another word spoken by anyone, the frog turned and nervously hopped away back the way I'd came, turning around to look at me one last time before disappearing around the corner.

Was that thing trying to get me to feel bad for it? Fat chance of that, but Toriel probably had plans to do the same.

At that thought, Tori's spell over me finally dissipated. "The hell was that about!?" I snapped, brushing her hand off my shoulder.

"I simply wanted no further harm to come to you or that creature," she stated plainly, in that obnoxious tone adults scolded you in to make it feel like you were below them. Which she damn well knew by now that it wouldn't work on me.

"What you did was-" I paused mid sentence. Why the hell _was_ I mad again? All Toriel had done was help me fulfill my promise to myself not to kill anything, and I was placing imaginary blame on her. Regardless of my temper, pushing away the one reason I was still walking and breathing would likely be one of the biggest mistakes of my life, and if I kept this up, it might be a reality. It took all of my will power, but I painstakingly decided to drop the argument. _Just_ this once. "-Actually...pretty justified," I muttered, forcing myself to cool off.

She nodded softly. "I should have intervened sooner, but I wanted to see how you would handle the situation," she sighed. "I suppose you were only acting in self defense...for the most part." Her eyes closed, and she pulled her hands close to her chest. "But I couldn't let you do something you'd soon regret-"

"-Tori, I promise next time I get jumped, I'll try things your way, alright?" I said quickly, desperately trying to get her to shut up and have us moving again.

Tori raised her head to look at me, seeming pleased. Once again, mistook my hostility for friendliness. Somehow. "Thank you, my..." she trailed off. "Let us keep moving."

She turned and once again took off at her usual pace of way-too-fast.

"Toriel!" I called after her.

I swear I could hear the screech of car brakes as she came to a stop and looked over her shoulder. "Yes?"

I avoided her gaze, scratching at the bridge of my nose. God, I was going to regret this... "...You can call me 'my child.' If you really want too."

That might've been the happiest I've ever made someone in the span of eleven words. Her ecstatic smile said it all. "Very well, my child," she whispered. "If that makes you happy."

 _It really doesn't,_ I thought, but she certainly seemed delighted. _All_ _according to plan._ So I went along with it, following her deeper into the Ruins.

...Right up until the pain in my elbow returned full-force. "Uh, Toriel, hold on a sec!"


	4. Chapter 4: The Ruins (Part 1)

"There you are, good as new, my child," Toriel murmured, gingerly sliding her fingers along my elbow, checking _again_ for any injuries she might have missed.

"I think it was 'good as new' about ten minutes ago," I hounded, yanking my arm from her grasp. "Thanks for the healing, though," I lifted up my elbow to admire Tori's handiwork. The skin had definitely healed at the very least, the black and blue now completely washed over by my natural skin color. Just to be sure, I gave my arm a little flick, sending a satisfying cracking sound echoing off the walls. "Jesus! Understatement of the year..."

Tori grinned and slowly pulled her arm away, an odd, faded green aura still clinging to her fingertips. Although I'd been careful not to lead her on, I actually still hadn't been able to fully wrap my head around the whole "magic is real," thing. The more I thought about it, the more I wanted to go ape shit and freak out like a toddler at their first magic show. Except this stuff was _real_ , and not just stupid shit like "magically" pulling a rabbit out of a top hat. We were talking full-on elemental magic you'd see in a video game or RPG, or whatever else nerds bury their noses into in their free time.

"You're very welcome, my child," she sang cheerily. Ever since I gave her permission to call me 'my child," so about three minutes ago, she'd been abusing the privilege a metric shit-ton. And I mean a _ton,_ probably around fifteen times already. I honestly couldn't tell if she was intentionally patronizing me, or if she was just dense as a brick. "Now you should be able to perform those acrobatics of yours much more easily."

"You saw that?" I said apathetically, assuming she meant my hand-spring during my fight with the frog.

Tori nodded. "It was quite impressive, actually," she admitted, refusing to stop hovering over me like some kind of giant goat-mosquito hybrid.

I shrugged, gesturing skyward. "I was a free runner back on the surface. It's the best way for me to keep moving without having to put up with anyone." Truer words had never come out of my mouth.

I'd been climbing, jumping, and tumbling over stuff virtually since I could walk. As I got older, I found that the farther away I was from, "home," the better, so I started to us my...talents, to clear my head and explore Ebott in ways I hadn't thought of before. 'Course it turned out that Ebott was the single smallest and most boring city on the planet, which ran me out of locals pretty quickly. Still, I never let that slow me down, and I kept vaulting and flipping over any walls (or cars) in my way, obsessed with perfecting the coolest and quickest route across the entire city, which is what I invested most of my free time into. Maybe I was desperate to breathe some life into the place, or maybe I was just really 'frigging bored. I was *this* close to finishing it when I...well, you know.

Toriel wrapped her fingers under her chin, deep in thought. "Free runner...free runner...oh, yes!" she declared, gleeful out of nowhere. "I believe I've heard of those before. Very interesting..." I figured she would've given the same response if I said equally exciting stuff, like "carpenter" or "accountant!"

With about the same amount of recoil that would come from a blow to the head with a rock, I realized that was probably the first direct answer I'd given Toriel in my time in the Ruins.

So to avoid any more of that absurdity, I stood up, taking a moment to stretch out my back, glad to finally have it patched up as well, and continued down the hallway with Toriel in hot pursuit. Our journey was cut short by yet _another_ puzzle looming in our path. At least this one didn't have any levers in sight, but the spikes were still obnoxiously omnipresent. One step forward, two steps back, in my opinion.

The hallway ended abruptly in a sea of spikes set over a pit filled to the brim with the same sloshy water I'd seen running through the aqueducts not too far back. I could see the path of spikes come to a halt and the hallway open back up on the other side of the room. Problem was, there was absolutely no way to deactivate the spikes, as far as I could tell. No levers, switches...giant eyeballs, nothing. Normally I would've just swam across, but I'd rather risk my life with the spikes than grapple in that shit, so...

"Well, this is the puzzle, but..." Toriel said, melancholic.

"Yeah? Go on?" I goaded. By this point I figured I could say just about anything to her without getting any sort of backlash.

Tori's brow was furrowed as it always was when she was fretting over something, which was about eighty percent of the time. "Hmm...would you mind taking my hand for a moment?" she asked, then without waiting for a response, snatched me by the wrist and started towards the spikes, dragging me along with her.

"Tori, what the hell?!" I yelped, struggling against her now iron-clad grip, but it was no use.

For one agonizingly terrifying second, I panicked. It looked as if she was moving to hurl me onto the spikes. The thought that Tori's inevitable betrayal had finally come blew through my head, her amenity towards me revealed to be a ploy to kill me as I'd feared all along. Until now I had pushed that thought deep into the back of my mind, desperate to have at least one person I could trust. Or maybe she'd originally wanted to help me, but had finally grown tired of having my ass around.

...Then I realized, if that _were_ the case, we wouldn't still be walking right now. So I took another look around and saw the intrepid Tori was actually _guiding_ me through the barbs, weaving her way in a methodical zig-zaging pattern across the cavern. The spikes retracted as she moved around them, kind of like hermit crabs when they come into contact with anything ever.

I held my breath until we were finally across and Tori's grip loosened enough for me slip free.

"This puzzle seemed a little too dangerous for now," she explained.

I promptly drop-kicked any lingering thoughts of betrayal into next week. Why the hell did I bother tormenting myself with that crap? _Not everyone's out to get you,_ I scolded, even though it seemed like Toriel would be the only one on my side. Power of two, I guess?

"Dangerous, asinine, and a waste of time. The ideal model of a puzzle," I spouted in a fake 'eccentric billionaire' kind of tone, trying not to hint towards my suspicions from seconds before. Even though she was dense, and probably couldn't tell if I mistrusted her if I'd painted it on my shirt in giant red letters, The last thing I needed was to risk her being suspicious of my suspicions towards her suspiciousness.

I pressed on without waiting for a response, blindly rushing into the room. It was absurdly long, and I mean _long_ , about the length of a football field at least, and empty aside from the usual decals of overgrown vines and lurid landscape, save for a single gray dot at the far end of the room. I honestly couldn't tell what it was from this far away.

Out of nowhere, Toriel appeared right behind my shoulder, giggling like a schoolgirl who just found out Courtney had been "doing some favors" for star quarterback Bobby Simmons.

"What's so funny?" I hissed, whipping around to face her.

Tori made an attempt to cover her mouth and muffle the laughter. Key word _attempt_. "My apologies," she chuckled, clearing her throat. "It's just...I had planned to challenge you to cross the room without me by your side, to test your independence, but you would probably want nothing more than that, wouldn't you?" she finished with a sigh...almost of defeat.

I didn't fully know what to make of that at first. Was she trying to make me feel bad or sympathetic for her? Well it wasn't working.

...Efficiently. "Aw, don't feel bad. I could list at _least_ two things I'd want more than that," I teased, flashing her my winning grin (others may refer to it as a "smirk." Yes, that was actually my best attempt at a smile.)

That seemed to cheer her up a little. It struck me as bizarre how I seemed to be constantly swaying Toriel's emotions in a loop of disappointment-to-happiness, as if I were her eternal center of attention. Or her therapist. Which, now that I'm thinking about it, didn't seem too far off. This was at least the third time in an hour something concerning me had upset her and I had to bring her back to reality. And, hopefully, the last.

"Let us keep moving, then," Tori pressed, a hint of sadness still dribbling out along with each word. A very, _very_ small part of me admired her dedication to tolerating me for as long as possible.

But _where_ did that dedication come from? Why would anyone go to so much trouble to help someone they, first of all, don't know, and second of all, is intentionally rude and obnoxious? Was she just incredibly kind...or...?

I shook my head. I was NOT drifting back to the "Toriel is a mass murderer" theory. Anthropomorphic goat murderers could and _should_ be saved for bad fanfiction.

The hallway took a full minute just to walk through due to its agonizing size. I wouldn't have been able to tell we were getting anywhere if not for the gray speck of a pillar drawing closer and closer. A breath of relief escaped my lips as we neared the end of the room.

"Jeez, how much farther 'till we get out of this-" I bit my tongue before I added "shitheap."

When no response came my way, I glanced around and found Toriel's staring at the column, now close enough to determine what it was.

"I was going to be hiding behind this pillar when you reached the other end of the room," Tori explained when she caught my gaze.

"Why bother 'testing my independence' in the first place?" I demanded, adding air quotes to dramatically increase my bitchiness ten fold. "You seem to enjoy sticking to me and monitoring my every move a hell of a lot."

"That's exactly the point, my child!" she exclaimed, nervously tugging on her ear.

Huh. Hadn't heard her yell before. That was...weirdly gratifying. "Meaning...?" I asked, genuinely curious for once.

Tori's eyes were darting around the room, focusing on anything but me. Clearly, I wasn't going to like this. "I must attend to some buisness, and you must wait here alone for awhile," she blurted. Then, before I could get another word in, added, "Please remain here, it's dangerous to explore by yourself-"

"-Wait a minute, wait a minute," I cut in, folding my arms in front of my chest. "You still think I can't take care of myself?"

Toriel, sighing, finally decided to look me in the eye again. Big mistake. I knew fully well I was glaring daggers at her. "I knew you wouldn't enjoy the suggestion..."

"Fine."

The sight of Toriel trying to hide her brain scrambling at my backpedaling was enough of a reward for agreeing with her. "W-what?"

I gave her my best attempt for a real smile, a mask for the gears turning in my head. "I get it. You don't want me going off alone like an idiot and hurting myself." I said coolly. "Totally fine by me. I'll wait here until you get back."

Her eyes widened. "O-oh...my apologies, I suppose I expected a little more resistance, my child."

 _And that's what makes this so easy._ "Who, me? Of course not," I beamed.

Tori's brow raised, and the furs around her forehead crinkled closer to one another. Although clearly still suspicious of me, she turned and fished around in her pocket for a moment, eventually pulling out...something. Her hand was too big to see what she actually holding. "Here, I will you a cell phone," she sang, dropping it into my awaiting hand with a _thud_.

Immediately, I recoiled. She might as well have handed me a king cobra. "What the heck is this?" I spat reflexively.

"Um...it's a cell phone."

"No." I held it up closer to her face, challenging her. " _This_ is not a cellphone. _This_ is a brick with an antenna." I wasn't exaggerating...much. The hunk of plastic seemed older than the Ruins themselves, one of those giant, impractical, piece-of-shit cellphones from the seventies and eighties that couldn't even fit in your pocket. I'd never owned a cellphone back on the surface, solely because I had no incentive to ever go out and buy one for myself, so the idea was sort of entirely lost on me. But even _I_ knew this thing was outdated by a good thirty-forty years.

I sighed, begrudgingly shoving it in my back pocket. "Whatever, it'll do, I guess."

Toriel nodded, probably thankful for any cooperation she could get out of me. "If you have a need for anything, just call." With that, she stood up to leave, filing out of the room quickly, casting one last sentimental glance at me over her shoulder. "Be good, alright...?" she begged, before speeding off to who knows where. Even if it was only a temporary split-up, I could tell it was hard for her to leave me all by myself just by the shakiness in her steps. Hell, she acted like it was the last time we were ever going to see each other.

And she might just be right. "... _Goodbye,"_ I whispered coldly, too quiet for her to overhear.

I counted two minutes out in my head and followed in the exact same direction. "Sucker," I congratulated myself. Toriel had taught me well over enough to get through the rest of this place, and if the frog was a good enough example, the rest of the monsters lurking around her probably sucked too. She'd been an ample enough guide, and somewhere deep inside of me, there was a half-decent person admiring her kindness, but I knew fully well it was time for me to move on. She'd been dropping hints about me staying with her in the Ruins, and that seriously interfered with my agenda. I already had sooo much on my plate, namely _anything else_.

...But if I was so sure I wasn't going to see her again, why couldn't I bring myself to leave the phone behind?

As if on cue, it rang the second after I'd taken my first steps of freedom.

I froze in my tracks. This was the part where I chucked it at the wall and laughed maniacally as it exploded into millions of tiny shards of cheap plastic.

"Hello?" I asked, although it came out more like a sigh. What I _wanted_ to say was, "Why the hell are you calling!? It's been _two minutes_!"

"Hello, this is Toriel."

"What's up?" _Damn, who knew sounding casual could be so hard?_

"You have not left the room yet, have you?" she asked, although it came out so garbled I could barely tell what she was saying. This thing's speaker sounded less coherent than a toddler trying to talk while gargling water and balancing on a tightrope above a pit filled with giant bloodthirsty frogs whom have a bone to pick with humanity.

Wait...what was I talking about again? "Nope," I lied.

"Good, there are a few puzzles ahead I have yet to explain, and it would be dangerous to solve them yourself."

I nodded, even though she had no way of seeing it. I told myself this was the reason for me holding onto the phone; milking a little more of Toriel's vast information regarding the Ruins.

Er...no goat pun intended. "Thanks for the heads up, Tori."

"Excuse me?"

I instinctively gritted my teeth. "Uh…nothing?"

Nothing but silence on the other end. Then, "Okay, remember, be good." The infuriatingly loud _click_ signaled that she hung up.

I jammed the phone back into my pocket, practically foaming at the mouth. Who did she think she was, my mother?

"Be good? Like hell I will…" I muttered to my new best friend, the almighty stick. I took a minute to admire it's peeling bark and utter wimpiness. "Looks like it's just you and me now, pal." And so, our intrepid heroes consisting of a whiny teenager with a shitty attitude and a stick of undisclosed origins marched onward into the unknown.

What could possibly go wrong?

The path split right away, with the choice of either right or left. I veered left without much thought, finding a room with nothing but a stainless glass bowl sitting on a pedestal.

My stomach made a growling sound as if the world was coming to an end. It was filled up to the very brim with...candy! A note was taped to the bowl, reading "take one."

Obviously, I could tell it was a trap from a mile away. Might've worked, too, if I had the IQ of a squirrel-

-I dug around in the bowl and fished out a piece from the bottom. That's where the best ones always hid, at least in my experience. Admittedly, I had a gigantic sweet tooth, and the only time of year I ever actually got any was around the same time any _other_ kid had any, which was almost always around Halloween.

My fingers fumbled with the wrapper, labeled simply as "Monster Candy." Even in a life-or-death situation, I was a sucker for this shit. 'Sides, it was probably left out by Toriel herself. It certainly seemed like something someone as insufferably nice as her would do.

I popped the candy in my mouth and was halfway to reaching for another when the taste kicked in. My taste buds were assaulted with so many different flavors at once I almost...scratch that, definitely gagged. It felt like someone was physically trying to beat the flavor into my tongue.

The flavor itself tasted like it was trying way too hard to be a mixture of every single flavor ever shoved into a candy, from chocolate to tang to sweet to sour to caramel to fudge to...

...Well I could taste a distinct lack of any licorice flavoring, but other than _that_...

Somehow, the candy hung around long enough to be swallowed instead of spat at the ground in disgust as I originally intended.I stood there for a fair amount of time smacking my lips & clicking my tongue and trying to figure out if what I'd eaten would eventually kill me or not. It left one hell of an aftertaste, for sure, so strong I was positive it would stick with me for life. I grabbed a couple more pieces and stuffed them next to the cell phone just in case I needed to poison someone.

Following in my good fortune, the path didn't lead anywhere else, forcing me to double back after only half a minute of exploring. What a great friggin' start. Maybe next time I can explore _two_ whole rooms before I hit a dead end.

The very millisecond I reentered the other room, another horrifying monster jumped out at me, eager to rear it's ugly mug my way. Maybe, "jumped out," is a bit of a stretch, it more so meekly hovered over to me from behind a corner. Actually, while I'm at it, "horrifying" was a stretch and a half, it was closer to horri- _fied._ The creature quivered every time I batted an eye, and looked like staying and fighting was the last thing on its mind. 'Couldn't really blame him, since everything about him screamed, or whispered, wimpy, from his pathetically skinny legs dangling from his tiny body, wings on par with a bee's size-wize, complete with antennas sagging so low he had to push them out of his eyes every two seconds.

I felt...kind of sorry for it, actually. All the poor guy wanted to do was be semi-threatening, but he just...sucked. "Uh, are you ok-"

"-EEEEEEP!" It screeched, then it zipped away deeper into the ruins.

I blinked. That's one way to clear a room, I guess.

I made my way around to the other path and followed it. This one at least seemed to go somewhere, and-

"-Whoa, shit!" I lost my footing as the floor collapsed beneath me. I scrambled for a handhold, latching on to the remainder of the stable floor as rubble and dust tumbled around me. When the sounds of stone bashing against stone finally died out, I pulled myself up, avoiding the jagged fingers reaching out from the edge.

I sat up in an attempt to catch my breath. Wasn't working. I brought my fingers close to my face to examine them. Nearly every individual finger was bleeding.

"Can I catch a damn break for once?" I complained, suddenly wishing for more of Toriel's healing.

When I finally felt like getting over myself, which took awhile, believe me, I distanced myself from the pit, took a running start, and leapt over it, no problem. Fortunately, my feet met stable ground. The monsters had certainly stepped up their game since lever pulling puzzles.

I was halfway out the room when I realized I had dropped the Almighty stick. Of course, when I went back to check for it, I found the hole I'd made was only about five feet deep, with those crimson leaves from earlier pooling where the Almighty stick lay, cushioning the fall.

So, needless to say, by the time I'd hopped in, grabbed the stick, and climbed back out, I felt ready to pummel the next ANYTHING I saw so far into the ground you'd need a god damn jackhammer, shovel drill, and whatever the hell else you used at a mining plant to dig their ass out.

And who else would have the honor of talking to me than ole' goat mom herself?

It took every single thread of willpower I had left to refrain from smashing the phone. "WHAT?" I screamed into the receiver so loudly I figured I'd shattered her eardrum.

"...Oh dear, you've left the room, haven't you?"

"Does it _really_ matter to you? Go ahead, what were you gonna say?" I dared. It was really hard to hold a phone steady when your hands are seething in rage.

"Of course your safety matters to me, my child," she swore, honest concern present in her voice. Then, muffled, came, "Ugh, it was irresponsible of me to leave them by their self..."

I didn't have it in me to care. "WHAT DID YOU WANT?" I demanded. My screaming had grown just a _few_ decibels louder than a nuclear explosion.

Toriel went dead for a moment, then responded in an almost desperate tone, "Do you prefer cinnamon or butterscotch?"

For one blissful split second, I felt absolutely nothing. Then the seething rage returned, burning through every fiber of my body like wildfire. My lips pursed as I brought the phone closer to my mouth.

"Hey, Toriel?" I began in a calm, even tone.

"...Yes?" she asked, wary.

" _I literally have never given less of a shit about anything in my entire life,_ " I whispered through gritted teeth. And then I hung up.

A few moments later, she called back. I don't know exactly what I'd expected, but it sure as hell wasn't; "Just for that, I think I might just leave both of them off the surprise I had planned for you. Would you prefer that instead?"

I already had a comeback prepared, but it shot off into Jupiter after she said that. She'd been so neglectful to acknowledge my dickishness for the longest time I had assumed she either didn't get it or just didn't care. And yet, here she was, finally firing back at my batallion of insults and jabs. Even if they were only pellets, they stung harder than I would ever care to admit.

It was made even worse by the fact that she wasn't yelling. Why couldn't she be yelling? At least then I would've gotten riled up in a shouting match.

I'd never expected the next four words to ever slither out of my hellhole of a mouth. "I-I'm sorry, Toriel..."

 _"Why should I be?"_ my subconscious argued. _She'd_ _only saved me from a demonic flower, healed me to full health, complimented me at every possible opportunity, taught me of the dangers I'd be threatened with...promised me a surprise? Even as I was so sure I wouldn't see her again?_

No, wouldn't let my ego get in the way of my better judgement. Just this once.

"Thank you, my child," Tori said calmly. "I'd appreciate just a little more respect from now on, and I shall show you no less, alright?"

I smiled to myself. "It's a deal. By the way, cinnamon and butterscotch are both great."

"Wonderful! Oh, and seeing as you're traveling on your own, it's important for you to know that if any harm comes your way, eat something. It should restore your well-being somewhat."

Okay...weird advice, but okay. "Thanks, Toriel. Looking forward to when we meet up again."

I could feel her mood light up from across the universe. "As am I, my child. Please stay safe." ... _Click!_

I hopped to my feet, suddenly not so aware of the pain in my fingers, and moved on again with a new spring in my step and a new determination to survive plastered in my head.


	5. Chapter 5: The Ruins (Part 2)

...You know when you have _those_ days that are going like absolute shit, and then all of sudden, the sun comes out, boss gives you a raise, and you win the lottery? Your mood rockets up to unachievable heights. And THEN, two minutes later, you find out your boss called the wrong person and meant to fire you for slacking, you read the number wrong on the lottery ticket, rain clouds flood in from all directions, _and_ your girlfriend calls, says she was only dating you for money, and dumps you like the garbage you are?

Yeah. The moment my call with Toriel ended, it started to feel like one of _those_ days.

This room was laid out in a simple enough puzzle, but one that looked agonizingly slow to complete. One pedestal to weigh down, one rock to push, a plaque that read "three out of four gray rocks recommend you push them," and a set of beloved spikes blocking my forward movement. I sighed and cracked my knuckles, ready to get this one over with.

The boulder was infinitely lighter than I expected; felt almost like Styrofoam, actually, but weighed down the pedestal regardless. With little effort, I'd solved the puzzle,and the spikes retracted with a sharp _click._ Onto the next room.

I breezed through the next one, too. I quickly spotted patches of stone with the same sag as the floor that had collapsed earlier under my feet sprawled all over the place, and this time the room was far too long to cross without taking the plunge. I willingly jumped in this time, and, sure enough, my fall was cushioned by the same crimson leaves as before, with a staircase nearby to make the climb back up.

Before I stupidly dashed up to make a second attempt, I caught a glimpse of yet another plaque reading, "please do not step on the leaves." After that hint, the puzzle was a breeze.

The crimson leaves lining the floor were set up in a pattern underneath the sagging ground from above. All I had to do was memorize the pattern, weave through the area above between the leaves below, and I was set.

I took each step carefully, making sure I was following the pattern exactly (which was a huge change of pace for me, by the way,) until I finally reached the other side.

Tori had been worrying _way_ too much over me. This place was about as dangerous and difficult to navigate as an elementary school playscape. Sure, you _occasionally_ fall and hurt yourself, like say, your fingers, as a random example, and since you have such a shit temper, you figure it's a good idea to start whining and complaining to whoever you talk to next, usually your instructor or teacher. Possibly of the goat variety.

I refocused myself for the new puzzle, which was just a rehash of the boulder puzzle with three times the rocks and pedestals. Thrilling, I know. What _will_ these wacky monsters come up with next?

The first two boulders were the same as before, sliding into place without my effort on my part. However, the third one was a completely different story entirely.

I placed my hands along the sides, got into position, and shoved it forward.

"Ew, what's that sticky stuff on your fingers?" Came a low-pitched voice ringing off the walls.

I would've acted surprised and tried to locate the source of the sound, but I knew very well where it was coming from. When you've found enough talking flowers and goats, you sort of become numb to finding a talking boulder. The bizarreness of the Underground had already long run thin. And I'd rubbed the warm, sticky blood from my fingertips all along its surface.

"...If I called it 'soda,' would that make you feel better? I asked sheepishly. My fingers subconsciously searched it's surface for a mouth or face of some kind, but strangely found none. All I succeeded in was rubbing off even more blood on it. "Now, could you do me a favor and shut the hell up? I have somewhere to be." Without waiting for a response, I made a second attempt at moving the damn thing.

"Whoa there, pardner!" It yelled. The sound had no visible source that I could find. It just rumbled outward from the creature, filling the air loud enough to send pebbles tumbling across the floor. And to make me wish I had earplugs.

"Yeah?" I backed off, exerting an exaggerated sigh of defeat, realizing it was resisting all of my efforts to force it to move. Looks like I'd have to resort to using my natural charm in order to soothe the savage...rock.

Unfortunately, I'd been fresh out of natural charm for fourteen some odd years, which left me in a bit of an awkward position.

"First of all, who said you could push me around? And second of all, who said you could talk to me that way?"

I groaned so loudly it hurt the inside of my throat. "Look, I dunno dude, could you just move over so I can get the hell outta here?" I made it clear I wasn't in the mood to have an argument with something that shouldn't and clearly _didn't_ have a brain.

...My natural charm, ladies and gents. Come back next week when I unintentionally convince Mt. Rushmore to commit suicide.

The rock hummed as if it were pondering my question, but I'm pretty sure it just noticed I was in a hurry and felt like wasting my time. "So you're ASKING me to move over? Alright, just for you, pumpkin," it said snootily, scooting itself over _maybe_ an inch.

"Seriously, dude? Move the hell over!" I pleaded. Saying this thing didn't have a brain was clearly a mistake, as it knew exactly what it was doing. The bastard only spoke in that condescending tone you used to degrade the other person and melt their sanity from the inside.

Huh, so _that's_ what it's like to talk to me. I almost felt sorry for Tori. "Hmmm? You want me to move some more?" it teased. I realized I'd been wrong about it sounding like me. Its tone was missing that sense of bitterness i typically used to put the other person down even further. Which somehow made it even more agitating.

"Yes, _please._ " I hoped this thing knew that I was well above dropping to my knees and begging, or else we'd be here awhile.

"Alrighty, how's this?" I could imagine the smug look on its proverbial face as it slid in the complete wrong direction.

The only way I kept myself from tearing my own hair out was reminding myself I'd get bloodstains all over it. _No, you are_ not _letting a god damn boulder get the best of you._ "You know, I was kind of hoping that you would slide over to the PEDESTAL, please?" I asked, trying and failing to keep the turbulence from seeping into my voice.

"Hmmmmmm? That was the wrong direction?"

"Yes!"

"HHHHHHHHHHHMMMMMMMMMM. Okay, I think I got it." It concluded. My heart leapt out of my god damn chest when the rock, at long last, slid itself over to the pedestal. The spikes sank into the ground almost immediately, like moles spotted by a chainsaw wielding badger.

"Finally!" I sighed, relieved to be free of its reign of sarcasm over me. Handling people just as frustrating as yourself was unspeakably irritating. It was like having an argument with yourself in the mirror. If your reflection happened be a rock, that is. Maybe it only bothered me 'cause I was on the losing end of the condescending battle, for once.

My sneakers squeaked to a halt under me as the spikes rocketed back up to full height inches from my toes. I gasped sharply and tumbled backwards, landing square on my ass. "What the hell was that about!?" I screamed accusatorily, whipping around to find what went wrong.

I cringed when my ears were assaulted by what I could only imagine was laughter, a horrendously ugly sound as if my good pal Rocky was gargling gravel. Sure enough, my dear, _dear_ friend was cackling like a hyena, having moved a little ways off the pressure plate.

"Y-you wanted me to st- _stay_ there!?" It asked in between laughs, literally shaking with amusement.

I felt the blood rush to my face. How in the hell did I allow this thing to get the better of me? At least Flowers are living, breathing things, but I just got played by something that used to be magma. And it burned. Badly.

"Are you trying to get me killed, you stupid, sedimentary son of a bitch?!" I yelled, already back up on the balls if my feet. "If so, I'd love to return the favor."

"Aw shucks, can't you surface dwellers take an itty-bitty joke?" Its laughter suffocated along with my patience. It seemed that it realized that I wasn't offering a hollow threat. "All right, all right, you can go on through, pumpkin," it promised. And this time, when it shuffled over and lay in the correct spot, removing the obstructions from my path, I felt confident it wouldn't make the mistake of moving again.

No matter how hard I didn't try, the scowl now seemed permanently stapled to my face. I was fooled again. AGAIN. Somehow I managed to not trust anyone, yet still slip into every trap and fall for every jape the monsters set out for me. Well, no more. I cleared the retracted spikes so quickly the rock physically couldn't have kept me there any longer, and I scurried forward like a rat.

A rat. That's what I was turning out to be. A pathetic waste of space who either mooched off others or was treated as a toy, a vessel for the monsters too experiment on as much they saw fit.

 _Brave ones, foolish ones, both walk not the middle road._ Yep, that sure as hell was starting to sound familiar.

"Not again...never again."

I brought my focus back to the situation at hand, tired of wallowing in my own self-pity. Over one hurdle, on to the next. Move on. Never surrender. Insert some other bullshit encouragement line here.

If there was one good thing I could say about my situation, the ruins actually seemed to be getting progressively tidier and tidier the farther into them I explored. Fewer cracks populated the walls, the tiles didn't look like they were trying to escape anymore, and the vines were fewer and far between, plus they didn't seem hell-bent on suffocating the place anymore. It felt livelier, maybe less decayed and claustrophobic. Not so ruins-y, if that made any sense.

However, I think what really pulled it all together was the corpse lying on the ground.

I stopped just short of it, what I initially presumed to be a corpse surrounded by crimson leaves blocking my way forward. One double-take later and I realized that I had seriously jumped the gun in assuming it was a corpse. Not only was it breathing, which to my knowledge corpses typically didn't, but it wasn't even...tangible.

Huh. So apparently _ghosts_ were real now, too. I guess I hadn't given those cheesy ghost hunting shows enough credit, because clearly they had a better understanding of the universe than any other person on the planet combined.

...And whoever did the Peanuts comics, because this ghost had that same lazy bed-sheet-over-the-head-with-eyeholes-cut-out Halloween costume look down to near perfection. Aside from the hazy white glow surrounding it, and the fact that the vivid red colors of the leaves were washing through its fog-like figure, I would've just assumed it was a fake.

"...So what's your deal?" I asked, leaning over to look it in the depressingly sullen eyes. "Are these horror movie rules where you're a dead guy, or is this Golden & Grey rules where you're your own creepy, _horribly_ misunderstood species?" Then, with a smirk, added; "If it's Golden  & Grey rules, don't think for a _second_ I'll let you tag alone, _capiche_?"

The ghost responded with one of the most intelligent thoughts of our generation. "ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ..."

My face and entire sense of emotion went completely numb. "Come again?"

"ZZZZZZZZZZZZ," it said again, faster this time, slamming its eyes shut.

Was it honestly pretending to be asleep? By saying "Z" repeatedly until I went away?! Like, not even snoring, just...saying "Z" a bunch.

This was overloading my retardation sensors beyond comprehension. "Hey, dude, no offense, but your act couldn't fool a brain-dead toddler. I can literally see your mouth moving!" I hollered, jamming my finger against its face for good measure. Strangely it felt somewhat solid, almost like jello.

...Gross?

"ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ..."

I sighed and pointed over my shoulder, back the way I came. "Look, I just spent five hours arguing with Sir Rockington Esquire over there, and I could use a good punching bag. So if you don't wanna end up as a puddle of ectoplasma, I suggest you get the hell out of my way," I said coldly, brandishing the almighty stick. It wasn't an empty threat.

To my genuine surprise, the ghost actually cut it out and floated up to meet me head on. It came up about equal to my height, minus his lack of legs, although he did make up for it with his levitation powers.

Wow. A _real_ ghost. I wasn't a fanatic about the paranormal or anything of the sort, but something about discovering a mythical being that only nutcases and that one weird uncle who was, "abducted by aliens when he was your age," believed in was kind of exhilarating. Especially for someone who had an affinity for proving people wrong and pissing them off 'till their heads exploded. It was that same feeling you got from correcting someone when they quote something wrong, only multiplied by a million. The only way it could be any cooler is if it didn't look like a drawing from the masterful hands of a five year old.

"F-fine," the ghost grumbled softly, with a hint of resentment to his ghastly voice. For whatever reason it had been lying in here in the first place, it certainly didn't seem happy I'd disturbed him.

"Great," I cheered, taking a swing at its head. It connected right beside his left eye, spurting out a...rather horrific squirting noise. Other than that, it had pretty much no effect whatsoever.

 _Duh,_ I chided, _you just tried to bitch-slap a ghost upside the head with a stick._ Pretty sure even Golden  & Grey rules wouldn't have allowed that to work.

All I accomplished was forcing another exasperated breath to escape his mouth. "Look, I'm really not feeling up to it right now," he droned in a faint monotone voice, gaze drifting around the room to anything but me, bearing that same blank expression that I wore anytime I was dragged to church.

I pursed my lips. Usually I steered clear of the depressed sad saps as much as possible. When people go out of their way to make themselves as unapproachable as humanly possible, I figure it's best to honor that and leave them the hell alone. Or that's the excuse I gave, anyway.

But I couldn't just ignore this one, at least until I could get him to leave. "Well, someone woke up on the wrong side of the leaf pile this morning," I goaded. "Why not just let me through if you're not even gonna throw a punch?" I smiled to myself, realizing he didn't even have arms. Unintentional mocking of the disabled complete.

My new acquaintance reared his head back, then leaned forward to let out a deeper and even more exaggerated sigh right in my face. "Very funny. Do you know how many monsters would make fun of me for letting a human slip by without even attacking them?" he questioned accusatory, as if I should already know any better. Then, as if embarrassed for speaking up, added weakly; "They'd...uh...never let me hear the end of it..."

I frowned. _Now_ that sounded all too familiar. Where I'd come from, anytime you so much as slipped up on pronouncing a damn vocabulary word in English class, you couldn't get enough crap for it until at least the next day, when some other idiot would make the same mistake. Apparently the monsters in the Ruins had the maturity level of aspiring high school drop outs. And judging by his attitude, this guy had seen his fair share of mocking.

I kicked around a few pebbles impatiently as I racked my brain for a quick solution. For such a pacifist, this guy sure was stubborn. Then came the easiest solution. "Alright, how about you attack me once, THEN let me through?" I proposed, snapping my fingers in an attempt to sell it better. It was stupidly simple, but probably the easiest way to get him outta my hair. "You don't look like a loser...as much, and I can go about ignoring you. It's really a win-win situation." Damn, I should become a door-to-door salesman, I'm _positive_ I'd make a fortune.

He took a moment to consider my offer, bobbing up and down like a fishing lure as he thought it over. Eventually, he nodded. "Alright, here goes nothing…I guess."

I tried really hard to keep from laughing at the poor sap as he attacked me. I know he wanted nothing more than to get me out of his...um...gelatinous scalp, but when your attack is so pathetically sad it makes the mutant frogs look like Godzilla, you've officially reached new heights of pitiful. Like, Space Needle stacked on top of the Eiffel Tower heights.

His attack was literally crying on me.

I jumped back expecting an actual threat (don't ask where I got that idea from,) and nearly stumbled when I saw the oversized white teardrops come rocketing out of his eye socket like a series of wimpy torpedoes.

Apparently, Spooky over here was one of the most deviously efficient tacticians of our time, 'cause the second I let my guard down, a tear splashed against my forearm.

"Ah, SHIT!" I squealed, dropping my stick to the ground with a clatter while hopping around like a mad prospector in a western film. My attention was so focused on the festering red wound oozing and spreading out to conquer more and more of my skin I didn't even notice the ghost's look of complete and utter confusion.

"Uh...did I hurt y-"

"-Shit, shit, shit, shit shit shit _shit!_ " God, it stung as if an army of killer bees had gathered to concentrate all their stingers on one spot. The pain was so excruciating I seemed to forget both what thinking was and how human speech patterns worked. Years of English class down the drain.

Somehow, while I was bumbling around like a chicken who'd lost its head, grown another one, and then immediately got it chopped off again, a voice rang through my head.

 _"If any harm comes your way, eat something. It should restore your well-being somewhat,"_ Toriel's words of...wisdom(?)...ran through my head. Still sounded a little out-there, but I was willing to try _anything_ to rid myself of this crap.

My hand, shaking violently, rummaged through my pocket until it grasped at a piece of monster candy. I fumbled with the wrapper, practically shoving the piece of edible garbage down my throat. It went down with truckloads less trouble, although I didn't exactly have a moment to determine whether the awful taste was growing on me or if I was delirious from the ever prominent flesh wound eating my arm.

I waited. And waited. And waited. And waited in god damn agony for something to happen for at least a full minute. _Dammit Tori,_ I thought, quick to blame her for the unreliable advice.

Until the pain completely subsided.

It happened in the time it takes to blink an eye, so quickly I was sure I was imagining it. But, sure enough, when I grew the courage to look back at my arm, the patchy red skin was being glazed over at breakneck speeds. Looks as though Toriel had come through for me for the millionth time over in the span of a few hours. All of a sudden, the title of "Caretaker" was starting to make a lot more sense for her.

With that insanity over, I had a stable enough state of mind to look the ghost in the eye. "You have god damn _acidic_ tears?"

Somehow, judging by the look in his eyes, I dropped his self esteem even lower. Natural charm.

"Uh...I-I guess so...I'm really sorry..." he whimpered. I assumed if he had cheeks, they'd have been blazing red.

Little did he know this was the first time in history I wasn't actually angry at someone for screwing up. "Don't be sorry, that was pretty awesome, dude," I praised, flashing him a grin.

A proud expression washed over his face as if I just told him he'd just saved the entire universe from destruction by the hands of our evil alien overlords. "Y-you mean it?" he asked cautiously, refusing to trust my praise, probably thinking I was joking.

Another first for me, because I actually wasn't. "No, seriously. Can't say I've met too many ghosts who could kill a man by crying on them. What's your name, anyways?"

He seemed hesitant to tell me, as if it were some big secret. Judging by his...you know, _everything,_ it most likely was. Eventually, something crawled out of his mouth. "Na-Napstablook..." he muttered.

I nodded. Weirdest name I'd ever heard in my life, but I nodded. "Napstablook, what is that, Russian?" I asked jokingly.

"Uh...I'm not sure...maybe-"

"-I was kidding," I interrupted, holding my hand up to silence him. "Look, I have somewhere to be, but by the looks of it, I'll be stuck down here with you guys for awhile. So maybe I'll see ya around?" I offered a handshake, then remembered he didn't have arms. Again.

Napstablook nodded softly, thankfully not offended by the gesture."Yeah...maybe," he said, managing a half-smile. "I'll get out of your way."

I started past him, crinkling through the leaves as I went, occasionally having to stop and tear one from the bottom of my shoe, when he called after me again. "H-hey, if you...uh, liked the thing with the tears, I have...a trick I could show you."

I spun around, crossing my arms and giving him my, "I couldn't care less," face, even though I could, as a matter of fact, care less. "As long as it doesn't involve burning my ass off, shoot."

On cue, his all-powerful tears flowed out of his eyes, curving upward to float above his head. They piled on to one another, steadily forming a...thing, fitting around his noggin snugly like a hat.

My jaw nearly dropped when I realized he they were _literally_ forming a hat. A top hat, to be exact, Abe Lincoln style, that seemed to lighten his mood. Coolest thing about it _by far_ was the fact that it still had it's liquid properties, bobbing around like jello, bearing the same color and clearness as Napstablook's whole faded white body.

"I call it 'Dapper Blook,'" he said proudly, with a new aura of confidence surrounding his words. Granted, he still sounded about ten percent as confident as the average person, but it was a start.

"How the hell did you do that, Grey?" I sputtered, still indecisively flipping back and forth between the possibility that whether Napstablook had physic powers, or if his tears were just imbued with magic mumbo-jumbo. "That's really frigging cool."

"Oh gee, I thought you'd like it...and I'm not sure, I've kinda always been able to do that."

I shook my head. It wasn't worth trying to figure out how he did it; I'd end up giving myself a brain tumor before I could come to a logical conclusion. And since when was logic useful nowadays? "Well keep it up, Grey. You'll have to show me more tricks like that some other time." I turned to leave for the second time, half-hoping he opted to come with me.

The moment I disappeared behind I wall, I froze in my tracks as Napstablook's voice fluttered over to me, almost out of earshot. "Heh...Grey. Now I have two nicknames," he began, sounding pretty pleased by his standards.

Wait...Grey? Had I been calling him that?

"I usually come to the ruins because there's no one around..."

I leaned closer, fitting my ear against the wall, all of a sudden interested in his monologue. "...But today I met someone nice...and a human, no less..."

"Me, nice?" I whispered to no one but myself. Clearly, he was talking about someone else, _anyone_ else. Probably one of the frogs hopping around here or something.

"Ugh, you're rambling again," he chastised himself. I glanced back to see if I could catch one last glimpse of him, but he already vanished, like fog chased away by sunlight.

I frowned. Did I just...befriend a ghost? And where the hell did he get the idea of me being 'nice' from! I smacked him with a stick, then proceeded to sneak in insults every few seconds, and we somehow left on good terms. Maybe his self esteem was so low he had reached rock bottom, able to tolerate even the biggest of assholes. But then, that wouldn't mean he would like me...

...Maybe he was desperate. Maybe I was a sort of last resort, so foreign and strange to him that nothing I could say could put him down any further. Maybe...

" _Maybe_ you're reading way too far into it," I told myself. "Dude was lonely, you got along...alright. End of story." With that incredible vague closure, I trudged onward, the after-taste of the rancid candy randomly creeping back into my mouth. "Dammit..."


	6. Chapter 6: New Home?

The rest of the Ruins, compared to the events preceding it, were pretty uneventful. I got attacked by an array of new monsters now and again, ranging from a pair of useless-ass jelly blobs that did basically nothing until I slapped them with the Almighty Stick, to some short, stubby creature with one huge eye that ran away screaming when I jabbed him in his obvious weak-spot, and finally a living turnip that tried to force feed me veggies by shooting them at my big mouth. No problem for me, since I thankfully wasn't one of those stereotypical kids who boycotted all vegetables that every sitcom and family movie took advantage of.

...Monsters were frigging _WEIRD._

Every time I chased one of the little buggers off, they dropped behind a few shiny gold coins, which I quickly discovered were the currency of the monsters. Figures they'd be using such an old-school currency living in a place that looked more ancient that the Mayan ruins, even though it had continued with it's incline of appeal as I journeyed farther into it. I thought I might be able to smuggle some back to the surface in a get-rick-quick type scheme...so I put aside a few to save.

Hey, money doesn't grow on trees, you know. And it's not _stealing_ if _they_ attack _me_ and leave their precious life savings behind. Maybe _they're_ the jerks for carrying so much gold around in their pockets when they fight people. Ever thought of that?

Whenever the monsters' pathetic attempts at attacks actually connected, I popped one of the monster candies in my mouth, cringed through the tasted, and went on about my day as if nothing had ever happened at all. Their healing effect occurred more and more quickly the more I used them, although I really couldn't tell you why. I guess my body was growing more and more used to the magic seeping through my veins, or some other shit like that.

I was able to spend my, ahem, "hard earned" cash at a so-called bake sale run solely by spiders, which believe me, was a lot less creepy than you might think. They must of been _way_ more intelligent than they were on the surface if they were able to run their own buisness, and I figured that it was more than plausible considering I just had a friendly chat with a ghost. I blew most of my cash on it, partially 'cause my pockets were running out of space quick with the amount of coins they were dropping (seriously, these guys fumbled their money more than little league football players fumbled the ball,) and partially 'cause I was dying to eat something besides the terrific monster candy that was steadily increasing my desire to throw up.

First thing I bought was a donut, which I downed immediately. It wasn't too much better than the candy, but it tasted like a five star meal after eating nothing but those sweets. Then I grabbed some "spider cider," kept in a bottle with an cap so I could store it for later. I wasn't in too much of a hurry to drink it, since the donut batter was apparently made from the same ingredients.

And what were those ingredients, you may ask? Well, as the sign sitting right outside the shop proudly declared, "Come eat food made by spiders, for spiders, _of_ spiders!"

...Needless to say, I nearly lost my lunch after reading that incredibly useful tidbit of information.

The remainder of the rooms, and the puzzles for that matter, were much easier to stomach thanks to their simplicity. You'd honestly think they were designed in advanced just so my time spent solving them could be leisurely. Drop in a pit, flip an switch, done. Read some cryptic message, press a few eerie gremlin-shaped switches in a certain order, done.

Toriel called a couple more times to check up on me, and this time I actually made it through her incredibly useful advice without lashing out at her. Especially impressive considering she was filling me with handy tidbits such as leaving room in my pockets for other items. Because I was really suffering from the mentality that pockets were just bottomless portals to another dimension, and no amount of stuffing could fill them. Don't know what I'd without you, Tori, but maybe next time you could warn me about an actual threat, like to not to eat anything that comes from spiders?

I came up to a hallway branching off in two different directions, praying to nothing in particular that I was nearing the end. It wasn't the biggest place in the world, but going through the constant cycle of walking into a room, getting jumped by some weird monster, rinse, repeat, rinse, repeat, was growing old. I treaded over a pack of vines carelessly seeping across the floor and continued forward, oblivious to the path of crimson leaves on my left clearly marking the way out, because I'm just _that_ observant, and continued on the entirely wrong way.

My restrained curiosity just so happen to work out this once. I stumbled through another doorway, blown away by the sudden change in my surroundings.

"No frigging way..." I muttered in disbelief.

The Ruins had completely opened up without warning, leaving me awestruck gazing at the massive city sprawled out before me. Okay, maybe 'massive' was a bit of stretch, what really caught my attention was its similarities to my _favorite_ place on Earth.

I sat on an incline towering above even the tallest buildings occupying the city. The entire expanse was walled in like the rest of the Ruins, but somehow the larger confines gave off a larger sense of oppressive isolation drowning the place, me included. In fact, _everything_ screamed, or more accurately whispered, isolation. Few lights glistened from the windows; most were kept completely pitch black. Few monsters roamed the streets; most were kept completely devoid of life, save for a few stragglers wandering around seemingly aimlessly. It felt like a black hole, sucking any joy out of the air and replacing it with an icy nothingness.

The Ruins had never felt more dead.

"Jesus...is this where Toriel lives?" I asked myself uselessly. Whether or not she inhabited any of them was besides the point. She lived and _breathed_ this place everyday, dealing with all...the few monster's problems day in and day out, like any decent caretaker would. Knowing her, she would assert herself into every little problem they had. No wonder Grey was writhing in a pile of his own dissatisfaction, if this is the shit he had to deal with everyday. I knew that feeling all too well.

...So it was a bit of a mood killer to say the least. Or a mood corpse offender, since it was already far into the grave.

I shook my head, brushing the hair out of my face as I did so, heaving a sigh. No use fretting over it, it's not like I knew the vast majority of these freaks anyways. We all had problems, why waste time worrying about someone else's, right?

On the bright side, I got a glimpse of something actually worth-wile as I was preparing to double back and try the other route I'd neglected. My expression lit up instantly.

"Wait...is that a knife?" I asked the Almighty St-I mean, no one! My brain had more or less been turned to mush after wandering the Ruins for twenty long...minutes.

Sure enough, I hadn't been mistaken. Sitting precariously on the edge of the drop-off was at the very least a knife-shaped-thing, which was certainly a lot closer to a knife than a non-knife-shaped-thing. Without a moments hesitation, I inched closer, wrapping my hands around the hilt.

I lifted it up, only to find it was...

"...Plastic. Dammit, could've used an actual weapon for once. I'd take a fricking Nerf gun if I had too." I'd been eager to get my hands on something that had a chance to do some damage (no offense Almighty Stick, but you just...really...suck); so eager in fact I didn't even bother to question what a plastic knife had been doing there in the first place. It was only half the length of the stick, but the tip, albeit dull as hell compared to actual blades, still felt like it could make a deep enough gash if the user wanted to do some damage.

And no, I hadn't gone back on my promise not to kill anything. Don't get me wrong, I'd been pretty much slapping the crap out of anything that came within reach, but so far I'd left nothing broken and bleeding out on the floor, let alone dead. It's just that having something a little more powerful might come in handy if the situation ever escalates above a slap fight. Hell, maybe I could scare these things off just by waving the toy knife around in their faces.

So I inevitably grabbed it and stuffed it into my only remaining empty pocket before leaving. I mentally face-palmed when the alternate path filled came into my view. It might as well had had a neon sign for morons like me. " **Hey assholes, go the hell that way!** "

You know what goes really well with depressing scenery? Even more depressing scenery, of course! Which was exactly my thoughts when I finally came across the source of all those leaves that had been littering the Ruins' floor.

A single tree was all that lay before me, black as charcoal, maybe about seven or eight feet tall, and old. Very old. The bark was cracking apart across the whole damn trunk. It seemed vaguely oak-like, but I'd be lying if I said I could tell exactly what it was. Certainly wasn't like any tree I'd ever seen on the surface. Granted I wasn't a tree expert or anything; hell, Ebott probably had about as many trees as the Sahara Desert, but never in my life had I seen a tree grow leaves like that.

The fullest crimson leaves I'd ever seen in my life.

They sat in a short pile surrounding it, clinging so close to the tree it looked like they were curling around the roots and trunk for warmth or protection. Not a single leaf still hung on the stout branches, which appeared to be stretching and grasping at anything they could only to come up empty-handed. I stared at it for what felt like the longest time, wondering what was so disturbing about it. And then it hit me.

It wasn't dead. The stems of the leaves I'd strangely grown so fond were hiding in the shadows of the thick branches, like insects using the bark for shelter. To my surprise, they grew incredibly rapid. One went from just sprouting to fully grown in the literal blink of my eye. I frowned, though. Still had this feeling in my gut that something was wrong.

Just the new leaf sprouted proudly to it's full height, something snapped. It slipped off the branches, sifting through the air despite the lack of any wind to keep it airborne, fighting till the last breath until it inevitably joined the ranks among its fallen brethren, defeated. A few more fell beside it. Any leaf that grew was immediately cast away.

Jeez, did hanging around Grey turn me into such a sad sap? Find one depressed city and one half-dead tree that, for some odd reason, can't hold its leaves on for more than two seconds, and suddenly I'm in awe, spouting poetry out of my ass like the next Edgar Allen Poe. Boo-hoo, the tree will forever remain ugly as shit. Who the hell cares?! What I needed to worrying about was getting back on track, finding Tori-

"-Oh dear, that took longer than I thought it would..." came a familiar voice to aid in getting my brain to function properly again. Toriel popped out from behind the tree, speeding along at her usual power walker pace, coming to a brisk stop beside one of the branches. Without even glancing my way, she whipped out her phone and instantly started dialing you-know-who's number.

I smirked at her behind her back. Leave it to Toriel to be so concerned she calls to tell you how pockets work, and yet so oblivious she can't see the same person she's fretting over five feet away.

Just the thing to get me back to normal; screwing with Toriel's sanity. After all, what kind of me would I be if I let this Perfectly good opportunity to mess with her slip out from between my greasy little fingers?

I silently darted around to the other side of the tree and crouched down to completely block myself from her view, then grabbed the phone out of my pocket, making sure to pick up the phone before even the first ring.

"T-toriel, is that you?" I whispered in a gravelly voice like I was biting the bullet, just quietly enough that she couldn't hear my voice without the phone.

"Are you okay, My Child? You sound injured." Her voice indicated she had already snapped to full attention. She was buying it."

"I got jumped by a couple of frogs..." I sputtered weakly, adding in a few soft coughs for added effect. "I'm hurt real bad...I'm all out of candies...I think I might be done for."

"What!?" Toriel cried. I barely kept from chuckling to myself. My Oscar winning performance had apparently been enough to convince her. Eat your heart out, DiCaprio! "Where are you!? I will come to your aid immediately."

"I'm not sure..." I croaked. Then, in my normal voice, said; "But there's this really dark tree, bunch of leaves everywhere, and this weird goat lady standing around screaming into a phone. I think she might be a little _off_ , if you know what I mean." I waited patiently for the fireworks to go off.

Toriel came charging around the tree, took one look at me and my stupid smirk, and nearly dropped her phone in disbelief. Her eyes washed over with relief.

"Whoops, sorry, wrong number," I said cheerily, hopping up to my feet. "Seriously though, you should've really caught on when I said the _frogs_ jumped me. Those things couldn't hurt a fly." Huh, accidental sincerity for the win.

I figured Tori would be all over me, checking to make sure I didn't have a single bruise on my entire body, but she actually started chuckling. "That was a very dirty trick, my child," she scolded, although it was pretty ineffective without any anger to back it up.

"Dirty tricks are my specialty," I boasted, absentmindedly leaping up and grabbing on to one of the branches for some random make-shift pull-ups. I regretted it immediately and dropped back to the floor with a thud. The rugged bark felt sharper than fricking barbed wired. "Besides, no harm, no foul, right?"

She nodded cautiously, her laughter drizzling out. "I suppose so..."

"What's up? You look like someone _actually_ died," I noted. She'd gone into this weird trance, eyes glazed over and staring at the tree as if it were about to come to life and chomp our heads off. Which, given the series of events occurring as of late, wouldn't really surprise me. Nature seemed to want me dead for some reason. Call a few flowers 'lucky bastards,' and suddenly they're all out for your head.

A moment of awkward silence hung dimly in the air. For awhile, I worried I'd somehow struck a soft spot with my last comment. Then I realized that was _exactly_ what it was and shrugged it off. "Tori? Ready to go?"

"Ugh, it was irresponsible for me to try and surprise you like this!" Tori bleated, loud enough to make me jump out of my skin. I had honestly began to think she couldn't physically be that loud, like she had a muzzle strapped to her vocal cords or something. I whipped around wide-eyed to see what the hell had gotten into Tori in the last seven seconds.

Her head was buried in a half face-palm, half face-smother combo, and her fingers were tugging at her comically long ears so hard I swore she was trying to pull them clean off.

Left me in a tad of an awkward spot to say the least. I wasn't really sure if I should comfort her, shower her in insults, or walk away slowly and inconspicuously, and no one would _ever_ know i was here.

I settled on something sort of in the middle...aside from the walking away thing, that shit was stupid. "Tori, didn't you ever learn you're only allowed to nag yourself over making mistakes when you're actually _making mistakes?_ " I interrogated in a tone that made me question who the parent figure was in this relationship.

Wait...the hell was that monster candy doin' to me, there _was_ no parent figure in this relationship!

At least I'd managed to help Tori to get over herself somewhat, as she peered up from her self imposed hand exile. I met her gaze, glad to find she wasn't crying, or we'd be here a good deal longer. "I thank you for your words, even if I'm understanding them the wrong way, but just because you aren't in any major harm does not mean I have not failed in my duties," she said calmly, folding her arms over her lap in an attempt to distract me from her diffidence.

A thought struck me I hadn't even considered before. When she had first found me, those few hours that felt like weeks ago, Tori had said I wasn't the first human to come here. I'd wager I wasn't the first one she's, "cared for," either, just because of how obnoxiously over protective she was of me. She was practically grizzly level of protecting her young, minus the snarling, biting and...you know, everything else that could describe a grizzly bear.

But that raised another question I'd been repressing for awhile now.

What happened to the other humans?

Somehow, my gut told me Toriel wouldn't give me a straight answer if I threatened to beat her over the head with the Almighty Stick, which was already ranked pretty low on my options list for a good two million some-odd reasons. Besides, that surprise of hers was sounding pretty good right about now, so I could stomach to put it off for awhile.

"Guess what, Tori, if the person you're trying to impress is telling you that you haven't failed, then you haven't failed. So stop moping over something that wasn't even your fault in the first place," I commanded, voice and gaze steely, with the confidence of a general in the military.

Damn, door-to-door salesman, motivational speaker, and army general? I was hitting all the marks for shit I didn't wanna do with my life today!

Toriel nodded, rising to her full height with newfound confidence brimming in her...well she still kind of looked a little unsure of herself, brow furrowed and a certain shakiness to the way she stood, but I'd take it for now. "Very well, my child, if that's the way you believe it's so." Apparently, my half-assed speech, if you could even give it that much credit, had gotten through to her. A little.

All of a sudden, Tori's expression blew up like ten nuclear bombs stacked on top of one another had all toppled over in her brain. "Oh, I almost forgot about your surprise!" she exclaimed, clapping her hands together and almost sending me ducking for cover the...what were on now, third time today? "Here, come this way, small one!" She shuffled her way through the ever growing pile of leaves surrounding us and sped off before I could even say, 'Holy shit woman, wait the hell up!' Still couldn't tell if I liked her better when she was energetic or when she was sitting around fretting over me. Probably the former, I guess, now that my tight ring of people I can actually stand already had one emo in it.

Oh, for Christ's sake, what possessed me to add _anyone_ to that ring?! Well, I gather Napstablook could...were these ghosts even in to the whole possession thing?

I followed after Toriel, forced to stop every two seconds to yank another leaf outta my hair, which thankfully wasn't necessary for too long. Not even a minute later and Toriel disappeared through an opening protruding from the wall, stopping a moment to make sure I was right behind her.

 _Great, more frigging Ruins,_ was my first thought upon entering. The repetitive nature of the place, along with the dimly lit and drafty caverns, and even the ass-tastic food was getting harder and harder to stomach. It seemed the farther I went along, the more I was reminded of Ebott. And no, homesickness was the _last_ thing on my mind.

Of all the times I'd been completely wrong, like, completely miss the target and end up stabbing someone in the eye wrong, this one hit the bulls-eye. On a totally different dart board that I wasn't aiming at.

The very moment I stepped out of the doorway, I was hit with an almost jarring warmth, so pleasant it felt practically unpleasant just because of how huge a change it was. I nearly recoiled and turned the hell around from that alone, but when my nostrils were assaulted with the sweetest aroma _ever_ (no arguments), I pressed on. The stone at my feet melted into a hardwood floor, and the garnish magenta walls that'd been haunting me for ages were replaced with a new eggshell white coat of paint, which was infinitely less aggravating to the eyes.

Tori stood proudly in the center of the room, a gentle smile on her face, basking in the glow of an _actual_ ceiling light. Never thought I'd see any of those ever again...

"Do you smell that?" she asked cheerily. "Surprise! It is a butterscotch-cinnamon pie. I thought we might celebrate your arrival."

Were we really far apart, or was I just trapped in a different world? Her voice sounded more like a distant echo. Tori's house had completely transformed the Ruins into something else entirely, a completely different reality than anything I'd ever grown used too. And it was a bitch to try to process all of it at once.

The house was small, but felt roomy compared to claustrophobic aura of the Ruins, possibly because of the high-hanging ceiling. Tori _was_ eight feet tall at least, so I guess it'd make sense she'd need a roof fit to house a professional basketball player. Everything, from the cleanliness of the floors to the potted plant tucked into the corner to even the dust-free staircase leading into the ground behind her screamed neat-freak, which, since this was Tori we were talking about, didn't surprise me in the slightest. I, personally, couldn't give less of a shit whether all my crap was in the right place, but here it felt comforting, and...

Cozy. That summed it all up. Toriel's appearance, her personality, and her living quarters. One word.

Cozy.

"I want you to have a nice time living here," she elaborated, oblivious to my eyes darting around the room, scanning for something familiar only to come up short. Why was my heart beating like I just a did a line of cocaine? "So I will hold off on snail pie for tonight."

Now _that_ snapped me back to my senses. "Whoa whoa whoa, slow down a minute," I begged, but either she didn't hear me or she didn't care.

"Here, I have another surprise for you," she interjected, even more enthusiastic than before, and turned to exit down a hallway leading off to the right.

You'd have sworn my feet were glued to the floor. Had she not given up on trying to get me to stay here with her? I mean, it's not like I gave any reason for her _not_ to, aside from literally making fun of every aspect of her life whether it was behind her back or right to her face. Maybe she was a serious masochist...or she was one of those people who felt they need to help every troubled soul that came their way.

I eyed the staircase desperately as a means of escape, but opted out of it. Tori was mental if she thought she could get me to live in this incredibly nice house that she spent forever preparing for me personally, even going so far as to make a special dessert as a means to welcome me, but I couldn't just hang her up to dry just yet.

...Wait, the hell were my other options again? Sulk back to the surface, get stuffed by monsters, or live a peaceful life with a friendly goat lady? Not sure which one was worse. Eh...at least getting stuffed would be over quickly?

"Is something the matter, My Child?" Tori's voice fluttered from down the hall.

 _C'mon, witty comeback, witty comeback..._ "Only the fact you keep asking me that!" _Dammit, that was weak._

She had stopped in front of the first door on the left, unable to contain her excitement. "This is it, a room of your own!" she said warmly, gesturing to the door wildly. "I hope you like it!"

I padded over beside her, still not sure exactly what to make of everything. "So, you're serious about this..." I muttered to myself, too quietly for her to hear properly.

"What was that, My Child? You sound awfully quiet all of a sudden," she asked, genuine concern creeping into her voice. Her hand mounted itself gingerly on my head, running its fingers through my hair in a comforting fashion.

Naturally, I instantly jerked myself away. "W-watch it." My face was burning hot now, but whether it was from embarrassment or anger or confusion, I couldn't tell. All I knew was that I needed a moment to myself, to think all of this over. My gaze fell on a couple more doors lining the hallway, and I realized her kindness was met with a certain desperation to have someone else to share the space with.

Maybe I was jumping the gun a bit, but an old lady living alone by herself in a huge place like this pointed all the signs to loneliness. I knew there couldn't be anyone else here, she would've told me by now. As obnoxious as she was, she was also far too considerate to have forgotten to tell me.

"Can I...can I have a minute to check it out for myself? This is happening kind of fast, I-I need a second to breathe," I told her preemptively, knowing she was about to ask what was wrong.

A little of the light died in her eyes. Could she tell I was having second thoughts? Did I even care if she did? "Yes, of course. Feel free to ask me if you need anything else."

I smiled a little at that. "What are you, a maid?"

Toriel smiled, too. My usual jab seemed to reassure her I was okay. "Hey, is something...burning?" she asked, a look of panic crossing her face. With that, she rushed back down the hall and into the other room.

With nothing left to obstruct me, I calmly opened the door and closed it behind me without a second thought. When I said I needed some time to myself, I wasn't bullshitting her.

The room was dark, and I could only make out the faint outlines of furniture. A dresser, a cabinet, maybe a lamp, and a...

A bed. _That's_ what I needed. Sleep.

I hadn't even felt tired a moment ago, but seeing a bed sent of a wave of exhaustion washing over my whole body. Besides, maybe an actual rest would be the ticket to figuring out where the hell I'd go from here.

My feet unconsciously trudged over towards the bed. I flopped down on top of it without a second thought, blanket and all, amazed by how comfortable it was. My head collided with the softest pillow in the universe, as far as I was concerned. Wandering through monster-infested ruins practically undiscovered by humans sure could take a lot out of you...

...

...


	7. Chapter 7: Heartache

_I was back in my room, at home, leaning out the window, the only sounds the chilling breeze rustling through my hair and the distant chorus of angry drivers slamming on their car horns. It was one of_ those _nights. My thoughts were stumbling around in my head so much I couldn't focus on anything, much less fall sleep. So I sat there on the sill in my pajamas, gazing longingly at the inky, star-filled blackness of the sky._

 _Maybe that's why I came out here so often. Nighttime was an escape from the desolate gray that hung over Ebott every waking minute of the day. At least then the stars' scintillating light shone through the smog, adding a splash of color to the city._

 _Occasionally, on the worst nights, I would glance down at the pavement thirty feet below, and consider how easy it would be to leave all of this behind._

 _But something was different this time. It wasn't me leaning out the window._

 _I was just a spectator, ripped from my body, forced to watch from outside, floating beside the window like an apparition. My gaze was fixated on the new person sitting there. Stealing my own personal solace. Its current inhabitors face was nothing but a vacant space. Long jet black hair falling gently behind its shoulders was the only feature I could clearly make out._

 _ _I shuddered, from both the cold and the eeriness of it all._ Who was this? An old friend? Someone expendable I'd already thrown away from the surface? And why the hell had she...yeah, she, taken my spot!?_

 _Real or not, my blood started to boil. I wasn't about to let someone else take my place so soon, even if it did suck. With all of my willpower, I forced myself to move, pushed forward, and started towards her to get back what's mine._

 _I don't know what exactly I'd expected to happen, but it certainly wasn't for her to climb up and balance precariously over the ledge._

 _My heart stopped. Every negative thought I had of her completely melted away. Without warning, my only intention had become to save this person I didn't even know, for reasons I was light years away from being able to explain. Common sense went out the window, much like her in a few seconds if I didn't act in time.  
_

 _She didn't move anymore, she didn't make any motion suggesting she could see me, not even so much as a glance in my direction. I still had time. I could still..._

 _I cried out in pain as something dug into my arm, coiling around my elbow. I whipped around to both sides, fidgeting uncontrollably, searching for a source. My breath caught again as it cut deeper and I gasped, but it was silenced. By what force, I had no idea, but I knew whatever this thing was, it was effortlessly trying to keep me away from her.  
_

 _It wanted to see her die._

 _Finally, I found it, and immediately wished I hadn't. Thick green vines were emerging from the wall, covered end to end in nasty looking thorns each bigger than my whole frigging hand. Their fingers slashed and clawed at me, coiling at an agonizingly slow pace around my limbs as they ravaged them, yanking me further and further away from the girl. I struggled against them with every bit of my strength, but it was feeble in comparison to their overwhelming numbers._

 _They were literally tearing me limb from from limb._

 _I couldn't think. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't scream. I was a pathetic little fly caged in a Venus fly trap, with no way out other than to give myself up. They wound their way around my arms, my legs, my chest, my neck..._

 _...Slithering down my throat._

 _I gagged and sputtered. All of it felt real. Every sting of pain felt so, so, so terribly real._

 _Blood everywhere. All going black. Losing consciousness, thank God. Anything to make it go away._

 _At last, the vines reached my eyes. The last thing I ever saw before they cut out my vision was the girl, without a sound, stepping off the sill, oblivious to the world around her, tumbling down, down into the darkness below.  
_

* * *

Nothing like the taste of dusty floorboards to get a guy out of bed in the morning. Although, if I were tasting the floorboards, I'd probably already done a decent enough job of that myself.

I jolted awake with my body sprawled out across the floor like a misshapen rag doll, tied up in my own blanket. Must've been one hell of a night, seeing as how it was literally coiled around my...

"Shit!" I scrambled around on the floor until I could get myself free and flung the blanket across the room. It landed in a heap of cloth, dust, and my various bodily fluids against the wall on the other side of the room.

I sat in complete silence for the longest time, listening to nothing but my own panicked breaths. My face and T-shirt were completely drenched in sweat. In fact, my whole wardrobe, which I guess only consisted of the clothes on my back, felt a good sixty pounds heavier at the minimum.

Eventually, I grew enough of my pair back to manage a face-palm. It wasn't real, _of course_ it wasn't real.

...But the fear certainly was. Christ's sake, I'd better not be morphing into one of those...uh...what's the word for a person with a fear of plants? A holy-shit-plants-run-for-the-hills-phobic?

Sure, that sounded good, lets go with that.

Unfortunately, I've never known myself to give up on figuring out what the hell was going on in my dreams before, _especially_ not the nightmares, and this one was no exception. Of the five W's, I had a definite "where," a pretty vague "what," a pretty vague "when," and an _especially_ vague "who?" Anything other than that were complete shots in the dark, plus the shots I had were still only illuminated by a defective nightlight. Don't even get me started on "why" and "how."

It made sense to be dreaming about home, I suppose, but there certainly wasn't anything pleasant there. Homesickness was the last thing on my mind. As usual, Ebott delivered on the bullshit, hands down. I couldn't even tell which bothered me more, the girl I _swore_ I knew - even though I didn't - or those damn vines...

A violent shiver ran up my spine. Yeesh, no, definitely the vines. I'd be lucky if I could get any sleep in the next three years, let alone the next three weeks.

...Botanophobia! That's the word.

Great, if that one psychology class I was forced to take taught me anything, now that I've named my own irrational stupidity, I was one step closer to fully understanding it. Thanks psychiatrists, your profession will forever be seen as nothing more than a complete joke to me.

I eventually forced myself to stand up, taking a second to stretch out my limbs...which only reminded me of the nightmare again, and I cut it the hell out. A huge part of me had secretly been hoping my entire escapade in the Underground had all been one long and incredibly vivid dream, an imaginative landscape I'd sort of created out of my own wretched boredom. It'd certainly explain the seemingly random events unfolding in front of me; hell, I'd still compare them to something along the lines of a drug induced trip...even if I had no idea what those were like in the first place. Regardless of the bizarreness of it all, I knew those hopes were foolish. It wasn't hazy enough to be a dream, and my thoughts were far too certain and controlled, unlike the bastard of a nightmare that drove me awake only a few moments ago.

...The rest of me, mostly my gut, was screaming for it to be real. At least that bit felt victorious.

If the uncountable strands of hair dangling tauntingly in front of my eyes were any indication, I imagined I looked like something the frog dragged in. The room was still too dark to make everything out, but I finally found a lamp sitting on a table on the corner. It was old-fashioned, a curvy design with totally-not-fake gold lining it's edges, but it lit up the whole room no problem.

Something immediately bothered the living hell out of me the moment I flick the lamp on. Maybe I'd been right about Toriel's fixation on the humans to fall here before me after all, since the room was littered with pretty much everything imaginable to suggest I hadn't been the first to stay here.

And I mean _everything_. Boxes of worn and uninteresting toys, torn and sewn stuffed animals, a chest containing more children's shoes in various sizes than any one goat lady could ever possibly need, and most notably, a crude drawing of a single gloomy sunflower tacked to the wall, clearly on par with Vincent Van Gogh's handiwork.

...Jesus, this room tried so hard to be hospitable it almost backfired and created the exact opposite environment. To be fair, a lot of the sickening feeling in my stomach came from the knowledge that so many other people had already lived here for who knows how long, and each one probably met some grim fate when they were out of Tori's custody. After all, the legend surrounding Mt. Ebott did explicitly state that no one had ever returned. Key words being, "no one," and "ever," and "returned."

I'd hate to know what happened to any of these poor little shits after they left here. Anyone young enough to wear kid size eleven's and draw something worse than I could muster with one hand cut off and shoved up my ass wasn't going to last five minutes out there, even when their biggest threat was a pack of angry Kermit the Frogs. Unless Tori had been the one to do them in, but as much as I'd rather stay suspicious of her, chances are if she _was_ the secret child murderer I was painting her as, she would've already killed me the second I fell asleep. She also probably wouldn't leave a surprise for me when I woke up.

I'd been so caught up in my panic-attack I hadn't even noticed the sweet fragrance wafting around the bedroom. Sitting in the middle of the rug on a glossy glass plate was a piece of pie. By the smell of it, Tori's famed butterscotch-cinnamon pie; evidently still piping hot if its scent was filling all the empty space in here.

I bent over and picked the plate gently off the ground, bringing it closer to face. Damn, it smelled good. It was a good sized piece, too, maybe a little less than a quarter of the whole pie. Thoughtful of Tori to leave this out for me while I slept...

...Without a fork. So close, and yet so far.

I quickly slipped out of the room with the plate in one hand and the Almighty Stick in the other, not even bothering to shut the light off, suddenly wanting to be anywhere but there right now.

I found Toriel by passing back through the foyer and heading straight into the next room. Those stairs still sat there nagging at me to descend, but there was no way I'd go exploring again on an empty stomach. Plus, basements suck. No. You can't argue. They're either god damn dungeons dressed up as a living room's third cousin twice removed, or jungles of twisting pipes that go _PSSSSST_ every five seconds, like that one annoying kid in algebra who constantly needs to be the center of attention, not realizing that their efforts are only going to net them the honor of dying alone.

...So, uh, anyways, Tori was seated in an impossibly comfortable looking chair right beside a fire place, nose glued to a book with a pair of round reading glasses resting in front of her eyes, hazardously close to falling off. The furnace was lit with a wimpy flame, but it was at least enough to chase away the cold, leaving a fairly pleasant warmth. Compared to the rest of the Ruins, it felt like summer in here. I sure as hell wasn't complaining, I'd take sticky and sweaty over freezing my ass off any day.

That book must've been pretty damn good, 'cause she hadn't so much as glanced in my direction since I'd entered, slipped across the room, and placed the platter on a nearby table with a not at all obnoxiously loud clatter. I might as well have broken it over my knee.

"Got a real page-turner there, eh T?" I goaded, poking at the table's rough flower pattern trestle. Tori must've had a damn flower fetish or something, potted plants and other patterns like this were everywhere. It didn't help much to clear last night's nightmare from my thoughts. God, those thorns were sharp...

"Oh, up already, I see!" Tori exclaimed, so surprised she dropped the book to the floor and had to fumble with her glasses just to keep them on. I really _had_ snuck up on her. "Funny, I didn't even hear you come in."

"Of course you didn't. I spent five years training with the...world famous Hoshidan Ninjas. I'm practically undetectable," I said smug as a bug in a rug.

She went wide-eyed at my comment, only made more hilarious as they were magnified by her glasses. "Is that so?"

I flashed a devious smile at her. "Yeah, I'm also an astronaut, a world-famous scientist, and married to Scarlett johansson. I couldn't even sneak a pack of gum through Walmart's security, hell no am I a ninja!"

"Oh..." she managed, sinking back into her chair in defeat. Leave it to gullible ole' Tori to lift my spirits up a notch after being traumatized for life.

Her shock was replaced by a disappointed frown as her gaze fell upon the table. "You did not like your pie, my Child?"

Right, that. We ninjas weren't always up to par with our social skills. "No, it smells great," I assured her. "I'm just looking for a fork is all. You, uh, do have forks in this joint, right?"

"Of course," she chuckled slightly, relieved. "We monsters aren't quite as uncivilized as you may think!" She bent down and plucked the book off the floor and straightened her glasses. Then, pointing behind her, said, "They're in the top drawer besides the stove."

I nodded a weak thanks, already taking off for the kitchen. I'd been within sniffing range of the pie for long enough, and the crazy good smell was starting to drive me insane. In these next ten seconds, my life goal was to have just a taste of that pie. It was downright manipulative.

Wait...manipulation...

I stopped dead in my tracks. Was that all the pie was? Not an act of kindness, but as another method for Tori to convince me to stay with her? One of Cupid's love potions disguised as a cruel, deceptive...harmless, delicious piece of cinnamon-butterscotch pie...

"No, you're over-complicating things again," I muttered to myself, rubbing a few straggling beads of sweat from my face. Toriel _was_ different from Flowey, I could feel it. Her intentions weren't to trick me or capture me...but I'd been fooled so many other times already, and I wasn't getting any sharper, no matter how I scolded myself. There was no clear way of knowing if I was walking into another trap. I might as well be walking forward blindfolded.

It was gut-wrenchingly difficult, but I finally came to a conclusion. I wouldn't give Toriel the chance to betray me, because I simply wouldn't trust her. Final decision, no more wishy-washy back and forth with it. I couldn't stay here and play a pawn any longer.

But god damn, that pie smelled too good to pass up.

The kitchen was infinitely smaller than the living room and a _tad_ cramped for sure. A fridge, a sink, a few cabinets & drawers, and a stove, all as impossibly clean as before. Why the hell did Tori even need a stove if she could fricking just fire-bend to heat up her meals? Eh, whatever.

I fished a fork out of the top drawer (no knives in any of them from what I could find...weird) and came back out into the living room stone-faced. Maybe it was best to keep up the small talk to avoid arousing any suspicion.

For a split second, every fiber of my being screamed to tell her the whole spiel about my nightmare, and ask her what she could make of it, but the words caught in my throat. Sharing that would be the equivalent of painting a big bright red target on my back. And even if she wasn't faking, the _best_ case scenario was for her to just brush it off as a silly dream. Plus, that wasn't exactly small talk, and dropping that bomb of a dream on her was just plain rude. So I went with something a lot safer, taking note of the massive bookcase shoved into the corner.

"You read a lot too, Tori?" I asked, driving my fork into the slice for the first absurdly huge bite. Two words.

Holy.

Shit.

Now, I'm no cooking connoisseur, hell, my greatest achievement in the culinary arts was likely not burning the toast one morning, but I was pretty sure even the stingiest of food critics would rate this thing a perfect ten. Perfect amount of moisture, perfect crunchiness of the crust, and perfect taste. Who the hell knew butterscotch and cinnamon went so damn well together?

"Why yes, I feel I read a fair amount," came Tori's voice, falling on deaf ears. I couldn't hear her over the nuclear war of flavor exploding in my mouth. "It's one of my favorite ways to pass the time. Although I must admit, you did not strike me as an avid reader yourself."

I fought off the urge to wolf down the rest of the slice right away and shrugged. "Eh, avid might be pushing it a bit," I admitted. "It's just of the cheapest way to let people know you want to ignore them. And I wanted to ignore a shit ton of people, so I started reading a lot. Simple as that."

Tori went silent for a few moments, allowing me another chance to dig into my pie, which was much appreciated. Try as I might to eat slower...who am I kidding, it was gone within ten seconds, without a single regret. I couldn't help myself, it was plain maddening every instant it sat on the table, taunting me with it's mere existence. So I devoured it faster than a rabid goat could.

Just as I'd finished it, I felt a not-so-subtle stare burning into the back of my head. I spun around, finding Tori looking up from her book, staring at me for reasons beyond me.

"What, I got something in my hair, Tori?"

She blinked and shook her head back to reality. "Oh, no, no, nothing like that, you just...remind me of someone else I knew. A long, long time ago. Please don't worry about it," she sighed, all in one breath. Her fingers were clutching the book a lot more tightly all of a sudden. 'A-and I want you to know how glad I am to have someone here." She added nervously, quickly changing the subject.

I stared back blankly at first, not really sure what she expected me to say to that. Either one. Clearly, she didn't want to talk about it, and was probably already regretting bringing it up in the first place. Which only made it more necessary in my head for me to pry further. Maybe she was referring to one of the other children to come through here...?

Whatever, it wasn't important to me, anyways. I'd be out of here before long, regardless of how much guilt-tripping Tori would have me sit through. I wouldn't let myself grow sentimental about her, but for some reason, I still couldn't bring myself to tell her I'd be leaving that same day. Instead, I put on a smirk and said, "Really? 'Cause even I'd be kicking myself out if I had to put up with me this long."

Tori laughed at that, maybe out of desperation to keep the focus off of her, placing a gentle hand to her mouth to muffle it. "Of course not, I enjoy your company." _Yep,_ _completely untrustworthy,_ I teased myself, but I still wouldn't go back on my promise. There could still be an evil hidden behind that smile of hers, just as their was behind Flowey's, just as their was a horrible taste hiding beneath the wrapper of the monster candy. "You are welcome to take a look at any of the books on the shelf over there, if you'd like," she suggested. "There are so many old books I'd like to share, history books, cook books, educational b-"

"-Got any novels?" I interrupted, inches away from being bored to sleep. However many teenagers she's met who actually enjoy reading anything that helps us learn, I don't know, but I certainly wasn't one of 'em.

"Um...s-surely there are a few in that stack," she assured me, a nicer way of telling me "No, I'm boring, sorry."

I stood up anyway, deciding it was at least worth taking a look. Monsters may have invented a completely new genre of writing for all I knew, so I trudged over, using my index finger scan for a book spine with something, _anything_ actually interesting written on it. Sure enough, I found no title resembling the name of a novel in any way; no, " _To kill a Monster-Bird_ ," or, " _The Monster Games_ ," or even a copy of, " _Why the Hell is This Kid Looking for Monster Themed Puns in Our Book Titles, He Must Be Mental_."

"Er...I'd also like to show you my favorite bug hunting spot," Toriel hinted, noting my apathetic expression. She might as well be dangling keys in front of my face now.

"Yeah...yeah, sounds cool," I muttered in response. Secretly I was paying her less mind than a fast food manager payed their employees, but what she didn't know wouldn't kill her.

Eventually, as my patience was wearing thin on one of the last rows of books, my finger rested on something semi-interesting that I'd been way too quick to dismiss earlier. In ancient, worn sea blue letters read, "A Brief History of Monster Kind," by who the hell cares, the other letters had long since peeled off by the look of it.

"I've also prepared a curriculum for your education." _Holy shit, this lady doesn't know when to quit_ , I thought. She was grasping at an empty jar of straws at this point.

In that same moment, I yanked the gigantic book out, cringing as I dropped it on the floor with a heavy grunt. Damn thing weighed more than a stack of encyclopedias. "Brief" history my ass, it had to contain the birth of the very first monster up to present day to fill all those pages.

"This may come as a surprise to you...but I have always wanted to be a teacher," Tori said to the side of my head, because no other part was listening anymore.

"No, not really. You already seem to enjoy chewing people's ears off enough." I crouched down and flipped open to a random page, surprised to find it was all written in faded English letters. Come to think of it, why hadn't I been surprised that Toriel herself spoke fluent English? The language was so ingrained into my head I guess I'd built up the mentality it was used universally. Was it the universal language of monsters? Maybe I'd find my answer right here...

"Okay...perhaps that isn't very surprising. STILL, I'm glad to have you living here."

I didn't even muster a response this time. The page was slightly torn, and missing a few chunks here and there, but it was all legible. The very first phrase caught my attention like a fishing hook. "Trapped behind the barrier and fearful of further human attack, we retreated," I read softly to myself. Only one sentence in and I was already confused as hell. "Far, far into the Earth we walked, until we reached the cavern's end. This was our new home, which we named...'home.'" I nearly laughed at that, but was still caught on the first line. "Fearful of further human attack..."

"As great as our king is, he's pretty lousy at names," I finished. Apparently I was right about the new genre of writing, whoever wrote this thought a history book should be written in the same tone as a third grader's shitty history report _._ But that wasn't what I was stuck on this time.

Leave it to a frigging history book to get the gears in my head turning again.

"What does this line mean?" I asked almost as an accusation, whipping around to confront Toriel.

My outburst had caught her off guard. "W-what does what line mean?" she stammered.

I glared daggers at her. "'Trapped behind the barrier and fearful of further human attack, we retreated.' The hell does that mean?" My mind was racing now, but the track looped pretty quickly. Monsters in the Underground, fighting humans...I knew it, I _knew_ it was familiar! And all of it was written down right here. _History_ book. Not fantasy, not a fairy-tale, _history._

Tori frowned and heaved a heavy sigh. She was done beating around the bush, I could tell from her now much more serious stature. Which was good, because I was done getting half-assed answers. "...This may be hard for you to believe, but...a very long time ago, many centuries before your birth, monsters and humans ruled over the surface. Together."

My heart leapt out of my chest, halfway up my throat by now. I'd read about this, when I was little and still didn't know anything about the world. Humans didn't remember it as fact. We'd remembered it as a fable, tall-tales passed down from generation to generation. All this time, I'd been secretly living in a world filled with mythical creatures and magic and...and...and.

Toriel stood up from the chair and removed her glasses, giving me a stern look right to my face. It was the gloomiest tone I'd ever heard her use. "One day, for reasons I can't quite remember, war broke out between our two races." She paused, trying to think of a good way to put it, I presumed. "After a long battle, the human's were...victorious, and we monsters..." she trailed off. "We were sealed underground, never to roam the surface again."

Her words chilled me, cutting deep, like a shower of icicles. I had so many questions, more than I'd ever had about anything in my entire life, way more questions than when the lead character in a story says they have so many questions. My legs felt weak. None of this could be real. How did humans forget about monsters? Why did we decide to fight them in the first place? How long had they been trapped down here? How did I go my whole life, unaware that this entire civilization rested beneath the most boring city in the world?

"Is...is that why all these monsters want me dead?" I squeaked. The one that had been disturbing me most of all.

Toriel snapped right back to full mom-mode, bending down so our faces were at the same height, her look of genuine concern flooding back into her face. "No...they don't wish any harm upon you, they..." She was choking on her own words. "They're victims of a false promise. A chance to return to the surface."

It felt like I'd been slapped across the face, multiple times, back and forth, alternating sides. "What about you?" I dared, taking a careful step back from her. My hand drove instinctively into my pocket, whipping out the toy dagger and holding it out along with the Almighty Stick to keep her at bay. I hadn't the foggiest idea what killing me had to do with returning to the surface, but in that moment, I didn't need to know. "I bet you and your little froggy friends would love to go and slaughter more of us, is that right?!"

Toriel was taken aback by my accusations, looking trapped, like a caged animal. In a way, that's what she was. "No, My Child, no..."

But I knew I was right about her. Like the other monsters, she was a killer. They'd started a war. They'd been sealed away. And now, they wanted revenge. Irrational or not, my anger boiled past the tipping point.

"I know you are scared, I understand," Tori ventured, her voice breaking on every other word. I flashed back to the first time we'd met, she'd said nearly the same thing. Only now the situation felt much, much more dire. "But I have never lied to you. I only wish to keep you here, safe from the rest of them." She extended her hand slowly in forgiveness, eyes pleading for any sense of understanding in my being. "Please...stay with me."

I stared at the warm, furry white hand extended to me. It looked so alien now. I didn't even care if her words were sincere anymore. There was no life for me here, or anywhere else. "I don't want to hear your _fucking_ excuses! I'm _no one's_ child!"

I turned and sprinted back out the into the foyer, oblivious to Tori's cries of protest. Those, too, felt alien now, rushing past my ears in a language I didn't want to understand.

My gaze drifted over the to the door. There was no way out through the Ruins that I'd come from, I was sure of that. I had to be a little more creative. _The stairs. That's my way out._ Looks like I was kicking my boycotting of basements to the curb for right now.

My body worked before my brain did, vaulting me over the rail, landing on my feet, and continuing down into who knows where. Tori may be old, but she was quick on her feet. I hadn't a millisecond to slow down.

The moment I touched down on the basement floor, the temperature dropped a solid twenty degrees. The ugly purple walls of the Ruins had returned on either side of me, but the dim lighting made them much more bearable than before, especially when they were going by in a rapid blur.

My breath caught up with me, coming out in quick, shallow bursts, but it didn't phase me at all. I'd been running nearly my whole life, and could easily speed down these narrow corridors for as long as it took to get me away from here. Tori's footsteps pounded behind me, somehow still growing closer and closer and closer no matter how fast I ran. She was yelling something to me, probably to convince me to stop, but it was all dust in the wind to me. Her words had grown stale.

I came up to a ninety degree turn to the left, literally throwing myself around the corner. The stone tore at the flesh on my hand, leaving a small gash along my palm. I didn't let it slow me down.

What if it didn't lead anywhere? What if I'd cornered myself down here with her?

 _Run. Breathe. Run. Breathe. Imagine there's a shark chasing you...wait, shit, that only works for swimming. Land shark, imagine there's a frigging land shark behind you._

Yes! There it was! A door! A huge steel door, with some strange markings along its face. The way out! I was home fr-

Tori pushed past me just meters from the exit, nearly ramming into the door herself. I dropped the stick and the knife and threw my arms out to keep from hitting the wall. How had she caught me? Was she really that fast?

Panting, I bent over and grabbed my weapons off the floor, turning back to face Toriel. She now stood in front of the doorway, panting like a dog, a stoic expression plastered on her lying, cheating face. She looked a lot taller standing there, a friend turned obstacle. No, never a friend. A minor nuisance turned obstacle.

"You still wish to return 'home,' do you not?" she asked, more a challenge than anything. I stayed silent, squaring off with her, only a few feet away. "Well, here is the end of the Ruins. A one-way exit to the rest of the Underground."

She paused for a moment to catch her breath, still tired from our race a moment ago. "I am going to destroy it," she said coldly. "No one will ever be able to leave again."

I took another step towards her. "You honestly think I'm going to stand by and let that happen?"

Toriel shook her head, out of disappointment, I think. Because if anyone here should be disappointed in the other, it should totally be Tori. "Every human that falls down here meets the same fate." It was amazing how different Toriel had become from the woman I thought I was growing to know in these last few minutes, from someone I'd been banking on trusting, a pleasant flowing, kind spirited voice, to something much icier and ruthless. "They come."

...

"They leave."

...

"They die."

...

"You naive child...if you leave the Ruins, they... _Asgore..._ will kill you."

That caught me seriously off guard. I was so sure Toriel had been out to kill me, but...

...Had I...

...Had I still been wrong?

"Who the hell is 'Asgore?'" My voice came out a little shaky. _Don't let her know you're afraid. Don't let anyone know you're afraid._

Toriel cast my question aside. "I have tried again and again to explain myself, but clearly, I should have been more blunt." She leaned forward, just within striking range of my stick. I could take her down right now...

...but I couldn't.

"I am only protecting you. Do you understand?"

Why. Why did she have to say that? Why did she have to make what I was about to do all that more difficult? After all this time in the Underground, after being completely unsure of Toriel, and finally coming to the conclusion that she was just another Flowey, just another big, bad monster out to kill me, she had to destroy my entire understanding of the situation. It felt harder to breathe. The walls were closing in, suffocating me.

"...Why?" I asked softly, barely above a whisper.

Toriel snapped back to her original position, no less serious than she'd been a moment before. "Why what?"

"Why are you being so nice to me?!" I yelled, spitting the words with every ounce of my fury. "Why are you even bothering to keep me safe?! You know I don't deserve it."

Toriel eyes shifted towards the floor. Even she couldn't answer that herself. "...Go to your room."

I laughed. What else could I do at this point? I laughed like a fucking hyena, and just like them, I had no idea what I was laughing about. "That's your big trump card? 'Go to your room?' How 'bout this one." I said through gritted teeth. "Get out of my way before you make me do something I'll regret." My grip on my weapons tightened. We were each giving each other one last chance. One of us would back down, or...or...or whatever happened after that, happened.

"You want to leave so badly?" She looked me dead in the eye, letting out an exasperated sigh. That was it, then. No more chances. "You are just like the others. There is only one solution to this."

Regret tinged on the end of her lips. She hadn't wanted it to come to this, just as much as I had.

 _Get a hold of yourself._ "Contrary to popular belief, I don't wanna fight you, Tori," I japed, without letting my guard down. Defusing the situation seemed all but hopeless at this point, but it was still worth a try. "Just let me go. You know I can handle myself out there."

Now it was Toriel's turn to laugh. Not her usual cheerful chuckle, a low, darker laugh. "Headstrong, indeed, just like the others. Now, prove yourself..."

A bright red-orange flame popped into existence behind her right shoulder. More joined in, forming a tightly knit circle behind her back, their sickly glow bouncing off the walls of the cavern, illuminating the dimly light walls. Each one crackled at its own rhythm. A chorus of light and fervor. "Prove to me you are strong enough to survive."

Just as the last word escaped her lips, the fire was upon me.


	8. Chapter 8: Burns Below the Surface

I clumsily tumbled out of the way as Toriel's first barrage of flames swept past me, hissing and spitting as they did so, and careened into the ground, the searing heat blazing far too close for comfort. Any closer and I would've been a sizzling pile of flesh and teenage angst.

I hopped to my feet just inches from mashing my face into the incredibly inviting wall. The claustrophobic cavern left hardly enough room to dodge Tori's mob of attacks, and I couldn't help but let that trapped feeling creep back into my mind.

 _Now's not the best time for a panic attack. Not until Tuesday._

Facing and staring Toriel down was a lot harder than I could ever admit. This woman had rescued me from certain death, offering a new home and all the love in the world you could muster for someone you just met, and here I was, ready to do whatever it took to put as much distance between us as possible. And by her determined and steely gaze alone, I knew she would do whatever it took to keep me safe. Even if it killed her.

...Or me, apparently. Tori must've learned how to save people from watching the serial killers in horror movies, because she was not letting up on the fire. At all.

I had little to no experience with actual fights (even though I was so reclusive I might as well have painted a target on my forehead for the morons who still thought spitballs were relevant,) and even if I did, I doubt it would've translated well when the other person was throwing fire instead of punches. But if there was one thing I'd learned from jumping around Ebott all my life, it was how to dodge. Anything from sidestepping wads of gum some idiot had tossed on the sidewalk to darting around people who were _clearly_ in my way, never the other way around, to avoiding cars speeding along the roads because God knows I wasn't waiting for the slow-ass walk signal to tell me when to cross. There was just one tiny problem.

Beating Toriel into the ground was going to suck for the both of us.

She silenced my thoughts with a wave of her hand, sending another pack of fiery orange projectiles my way. This time, I was ready, and flattened myself against the stone, watching the suckers sail past uselessly.

 _Move._

My fingers clutched the hilts of my weapons, tighter and tighter 'till the knuckles were white as snow.

 _...Don't just stand there, move!_

Had someone super-glued my feet to the floor? Dammit Tori, why didn't you just back down when you had the chance...why couldn't you have been a wimp like all the others...

I begrudgingly pushed forward as Toriel readied another bolt of fire. The distance between us felt way longer all of a sudden. Inches turned to feet turned to yards turned to miles of the Ruins that stretched out between us now, a seemingly infinite and ever-growing road, each step heavier than the last. It took excruciating centuries of bobbing and weaving through the flames before I was finally close enough to deliver a heavy blow to her left arm with both my stick and my plastic knife, so close I could see each individual tuft of her fur as they were severed.

Toriel remained unphased by the blow despite the wound festering and blood pouring out from the mark it left, staining her fur a dark red. Instead, she conjured yet another array of fire spinning around her in an attempt to drive me back.

 _Too slow._

I quickly dashed to the inside of the circle of flames and rolled under them, now practically right on top of Toriel. Without a second thought, or even a pause to catch my breath, I drove my toy knife into her knee hard enough to draw blood,despite its dull edge, and rose to smack her across the snout with the edge of the Almighty Stick, forcing a pained grunt from her muzzle. Satisfied, I leapt backwards on the balls of my feet before she could counter attack.

...At first, I was proud. Proud I was holding my own against a magical fire-shooting creature, when I had barely so much as clashed knuckles with the neanderthals back home. Then the reality of the situation sunk in and I went wide-eyed.

And all that pride manifested itself into horror.

The wounds that...that I had caused weren't major, but in that moment, they seemed cataclysmic. Scratches on her arm, leg, and a pair on her snout oozed with blood and plagued her coat of fur and dress, no matter how shallow they were. I glanced down at my weapons and choked. The tips were caked in the same grotesque liquid.

It was so different from failing a jump and scraping my knees and elbows on the pavement. Here, the injuries were on another person, and it was my fault. Toriel was seriously hurt, and it was all my fault.

I met her gaze head-on. Her eyes were so focused it was as if she were staring through my hollow body. "Is that proof enough, for you Tori?" I yelled, flicking the dagger in a weak attempt of cleaning it. "You've had enough?" Damn, was my voice cracking? _Get a grip._

Her answer was already made clear by the tight, motionless muscles on her face. She wasn't done just yet.

... _I don't care._

... _You don't care._

... _Of course you don't, why would you? It was so much easier not to care._

With a cry of something between desperation and anger, I charged her again. Fire spread across the ground in snaking rivulets attempting to block my path. I hot-footed over them, ducking every few seconds as even more fireballs rained down from overhead. Tori had turned the cavern into a wildfire in just a matter of moments. It felt like being trapped in an giant oven, burning hot and suffocating. Beads of sweat running down my face merged into streams.

 _Shit._ I stopped just short of my oppressor as a new kind of pain flooded my body.

My shoulder was on fire. It was smoldering one minute, and now it was ablaze, inches from my hair and face. Shirt, skin, and all.

I panicked. At first, The effect of the burn was difficult to pick out from the waves of heat surrounding me, but the scorching effect it left had pierced my nervous system. It started to hurt. A lot. And stop, dropping, and rolling was substantially less effective when the floor was also, in fact, on fire.

As if I wasn't dealing with enough shit already, the smoke had quickly become unbearable, filling every space of air left in the hallway, and my lungs. I Bent over and hacked out a sick, raspy cough. In the end, that's what saved me. Just as I was being overwhelmed, that one cough brought everything back into focus.

Out of time, I jammed my good arm into my pocket, pulling out a last resort. My last piece of monster candy. I had no idea if the healing would be strong enough to fix my charred flesh, but it was the only trick I had left up my sleeve. Assuming it hadn't already burned to cinders.

It fell into my mouth with the wrapper still intact. It went down without a problem this time, there was so much more to worry about. I waited in vain for it's magical charm to take place.

 _One second._

I'd done all I could.

 _Two seconds._

Toriel...why were you doing this...

 _Three seconds._

Knock it off...!

 _Four seconds._

MAKE IT STOP!

 _Five seconds._

I sighed through more smoke than air. Finally, relief swelled through my shoulder, and the rest of my body, too. I risked a glance at the burn, using my other arm to shield my eyes from the smog and heat, more than surprised to find that the candy's magic had not only healed my shoulder, but had eradicated any of the lingering fire. It'd left a huge hole in my T-shirt, but that paled in comparison to the pain I'd felt moments before.

...And how I'd just swallowed a candy wrapper whole, but I could worry about that later.

Reinvigorated, I turned back to Toriel. Her stoic expression had finally broken. Hints of concern once again shown in her eternally deep eyes, black as coal and shining in the bright light of the fire. Her hands shook. All around her, the flames flickered and faded, not completely disappearing, but weakening enough to allow some oxygen to creep back in.

Angry. I felt angry. Angry and betrayed at Tori for watching me in so much pain, not only doing so little to stop it, but being the cause of it all. A woman who'd done everything she could to keep me safe, had been trying to...

Trying to...

The fire. My attention snapped back to the fire. It was arcing around me know. I was wrong; it hadn't ceased. I stood motionless as more fireballs were hurled my way, completely missing their target, so far off I almost swore their intention wasn't even to hit me. Almost...

"...You're doing this on purpose, right?"

She averted her gaze. More and more fireballs rained down, more and more fireballs missed.

"You...you either wanted me to win...or you wanted me to run. That was it." I wasn't even sure if I was trying to convince myself or her at this point. I didn't care. Everything besides Tori was now a part of the background.

"Well...well guess what?" I chucked the toy knife and the stick down at the floor. They clambered against the ground until they ended up in a heap at Toriel's feet. "I'm not going to fight you anymore," I said, struggling to keep my voice calm and assertive. "And I'm _not_ gonna run back upstairs like the scared little kid you want me to be."

She did a poor job of hiding the sob that came afterward in the sleeve of her dress. "I know you want to home but..." she choked, muffled by the fabric. Her face spun slowly around to face me again, tears threatening to pour down her face. "But please...go upstairs now."

I winced. I actually winced. A nagging feeling screamed in my stomach, and I regretted every second I was ever nasty to hear.

 _Stay strong...for her._ "No."

"...I promise I will take good care of you here." She stifled another sob. I bite down another wince. "I-I know we do not have much, but we can have a good life here."

The last of the flames had died out. An eerie blackness now blanketed the cavern. That and soot. A smile hung on the end of Toriel's lips, her real last attempt to get me to stay.

It actually almost worked. The idea of staying here and living with someone...no, not just _someone;_ with Toriel, a person who actually _cared._ It didn't matter about what, she just... _cared._ It was almost too good to pass up. What was I really so eager to return the surface for? To live miserably in Ebott for the rest of my life, 'till I get fed up with the world all over again and overdose on some shit dealt to me by a stranger, alone, in a desolate alley? All this fighting, and I didn't even know _why_ I was fighting in the first place...

Deep down, the reason came to me. Ebott, has much of a shit-heap as it was, had a way out. One day, if I played my cards right, I could just hop in a car and drive far away to who knows where. What was there for me down here in the Ruins? Bug collecting? One bookshelf stocked with nothing but history and cook books?

The memory of discovering the monsters' ruined city crept back into my mind, equally if not even more desolate than life would have no drive. No purpose. Even less purpose than it did now.

...Damn, negative purpose in life. Must be a new record.

I chose my next words carefully, giving Toriel my most sincere expression of remorse I'd ever mustered in my life. "Tori...I'm sorry but..."

Her smiled faded. She knew exactly what was coming next.

"But I can't." A silence heavier than iron clung desperately to the air. Not even Toriel's sobs dared to penetrate it. I felt all the tension in the world grow between us.

Until I decided to break it, once and for all. "I've spent my whole life cooped up in one tiny city, a prison, hoping for a way out. And now that I've found one...

...I'm not ready to spend the rest of it caged in another."

Tori took a deep breath and wiped the tears from her eyes. When she looked up again, she whispered, softer than felt, "I understand."

Huh. Not exactly what I was expecting to hear. I would say I didn't expect her to give up so easily, but I think "so easily" went out the window three thousands years ago.

"You would just be unhappy trapped down here," she explained. This time I knew for sure she was only convincing herself. "The Ruins are very small once you get used to them. It would not be right to have you spend the rest of your precious childhood here.

"My expectations...

"My loneliness...

"My fear...

"For you, my child, I will put them aside," she finished with more confidence I'd ever heard crammed into any voice.

...I smirked at her. "I really appreciate it and all, but do you think next time you can _lead_ with that, and maybe we could skip the part where you shoot fireballs at me for seven centuries?"

Tori beamed back at me. No one had ever looked so happy to hear my crappy condescending tone seep back into my voice. "I suppose we could, however, when you leave...please do not come back."

Ouch, she just had to tear the rug out from under me one last time, didn't she?

"I hope you understand."

Hope I understand!? First she risks her life to get me to stay, then tells me I could never come back? I had an entire counter argument all ready when I realized she was just being realistic.

Once I was gone, I was on a non-stop ride all the way back to the surface. She didn't want to trouble herself with the possibility of my return, or being responsible for my death. From what I'd seen, she already had enough of a burden to bear.

So when enough time had passed, I gave an honest answer. "Yeah...yeah, I think I do."

Tori nodded in thanks, turning her attention to her still bleeding wounds. "I apologize, but I must tend to these before they get infected."

"Oh, sorry about that." I began, a dangerous pun brewing in my head. "Got a little caught up in the...'heat' of the moment."

That was enough for Tori to burst out laughing. An eyes-closed, gripping-stomach-as-if-it-were-about-to-tumble-out, choking-on-every-breath kind of laugh. Like, exploding in laughter, ricocheting off every wall, so loud the whole world could hear it from here laughter. If puns could kill, then this was the friggin' nuke. It was loud enough for me to flinch and pretty much regretting saying anything at all.

...Almost. "Alright, alright! It wasn't _that_ funny Toriel, chill out..." I pleaded. _Well that completely trashed the moment,_ I thought. I was halfway to up and leaving on my own, since it would save us both an even longer goodbye, when she bent over and threw her arms around me, still chuckling to herself.

My whole body went numb. Tori's embrace was impossibly warm and inviting, much like the person herself. Comforting, and yet...completely foreign. I felt spine shoot up until I was perfectly vertical. One half wanted to stay here like this forever, and the other was debating whether it should give up and return the gesture or squirm around until I could wriggle out and book it too the exit. In the end, I still couldn't bring myself to move. Figures.

"Pathetic, is it not?" She murmured into my ear. I didn't have much of a choice but to listen, but for once, I didn't mind. "I cannot save even a single child."

I suddenly had a million things I wanted to say to her, and no way to say any of it. My mind grasped onto the most generic comforting line it could think of. "I'll be okay...I promise."

Cliché or not, it definitely seemed to do the trick. Toriel released me the millisecond the last word curled out from my lips, and without another word, just a look of sorrow and hopefulness rolled into one, she left back down the hallway we'd come from.

I'd been wrong before. She was gone far too quickly for it to have been any longer than a few meters.

I felt like a total idiot. I'd done it. The Ruins would soon be far behind me. I'd conquered all of its puzzles, fought all of its "threatening" monsters, and met an unforgettable woman who, with her crushing kindness, made me jump through so many hoops just to finally get out. I should've felt some sense of triumph. Instead, now that I was finally leaving it behind, all I wanted to do was stay. The burns on my skin may be gone, but some went way deeper than that.

The phrase, "you don't know what you have until it's gone," had never meant anything to me before, just another bullshit line people spewed to help them get over a hurdle in their life. To relate themselves to the other sad-saps in their position. But now that I was experiencing it first-hand...

...It was still bullshit. I was well aware of what I was getting into by leaving her. What I was giving up. I knew the consequences. But I still made the choice, and there was no point in looking back on it. What's done is done. At least, that's what I told myself to get my mind off of Toriel.

 _It was so much easier not to care._

Another minute or two or eighty passed before I recovered from the stasis T-...that _she_ , had left on me, first bending over to grab my toy knife, and my reappointed best friend, the Almighty Stick. Somehow It'd gone that whole battle without catching fire once. Maybe the ironic name I'd given it was well placed after all, or maybe it was just lucky as all hell. Who knew.

Content with my just-thorough-enough examination, I faced the twin doors. The markings I'd noticed before stood out to me now more than ever.

Plastered on the face of the door, black as ash, was a symbol I'd certainly never seen before on the surface. A diamond with angelic wings spread out to each side hovered over a set of three small triangles forming the shape of what I could only identify as a smiley-face. I didn't know what it meant, and now that I was looking at it again, I realized I didn't care.

I placed a heavy hand on the door, taking one last look around the barren walls of the Ruins. I don't know what I was expecting to see, maybe Toriel coming back to say she'd changed her mind and would follow me all the way to the surface. Of course, that was just a hopeless fantasy. Naiveté like that was the biggest thing holding me back, and had been since the moment woke up surrounding by those golden flowers. I needed to move on.

"Here goes nothing..." I sighed, and pushed open the doors, disappearing quietly behind them with a soft _thud_ as they closed against the stone.

* * *

Another long, empty hallway. I honestly don't know what I'd expected at that point. Other explorers in books and movies always complained that there were _always_ people out to kill them, or how _everything_ was booby trapped, or how there w _as_ _always_ a bigger fish or something. Meanwhile, whenever something completely useless wasn't attacking me, I was basically playing hallway simulator, waiting in vain for something to change. I'd sooner go back to when Tori was trying to kill me...

...Dammit, I was already back to thinking about Toriel. _Come on, focus on anything else...literally anything...  
_

Something between a grunt and a yell of frustration shot from my mouth as a passed by brick number two million sixty-six. Would the Ruins ever end? Did the entire Underground have the same washed out, ugly appearance?

A shiver ran through my body. With each step I took farther into the cavern, it became dimmer and icier than with the last. Because there wasn't already enough shit going on to have me missing Toriel's cottage, why not add progressively shittier and shittier conditions into the mix, too? It wasn't just rubbing salt into the wound, it was picking at the scab with a rusty knife.

Just as I was getting tired of picking at the goosebumps on my arms, the hallway opened up into a new room just as boring as the last. It was pitch black except for a bit of light seeping from a hole in the ceiling.

If there was some greater force hanging out up in the sky, then I was two hundred percent sure it had it out for me. Basking in its glow was a familiar face I'd been _this_ close to forgetting, and the last thing on the planet I wanted to bump into.

"Clever! Verrrryyy clever," it said smugly, it's face lighting up the moment I entered.

This bastard chose a bad time to rear his repulsive mug around me. "Don't tell me _your_ scrawny ass is still slithering around here," I spat at the golden flower as it wore an insanely broad smile. "I thought Toriel incinerated you. Would've been doing the world a favor..."

An obnoxiously complacent look came over Flowey's unsightly, lying, sorry excuse for a face. "Aw, what's the matter? Throwing a tantrum now that mommy isn't around to babysit you?" he cackled. That insane laughter would fit right at home in a mental ward. "Besides, that woman's magic isn't nearly strong enough to kill _me_. And you're _still_ worthless without that old bag of bones."

Damn, he was setting a new world record for how quickly you could reach my last straw. I drew my weapons and said, "Talk about Toriel and I like that again and I'll break your teeth."

What a pair of charming young gentlemen.

My threat only made him laugh louder. The echo gave off the horrifying effect that there were multiple of this freak of nature. Was it worth stabbing myself in the ear if I never had to listen to him again? "That's adorable! You actually think you've given me any reason to be afraid of you!"

For every second I had to listen to him speak, I felt another brain cell popping. Somehow, I forced myself to get a grip and stomach my anger. All he wanted was to get a rise out of me, and the last thing I wanted to do was give him that satisfaction.

With a deep breath, I said, "You seem pretty cheery, considering you were dead wrong."

Flowey was still completely unphased. "Oh, sorry, I seem to have forgotten." Malice bled through his mock-sympathy like hot water through a tissue. "Please, enlighten me."

 _He's not making this easy._ "Do I really need to spell it out for you? Wait _...riiight,_ thinking would be way too hard for something without a brain!"

He nodded along with my insult, urging me continue. I kept an eyes peeled for any and all "friendliness pellets" that may come my way.

"'In this world, it's kill or be killed,'" I recited in my best Flowey impression, which basically translated to making my voice as irritating as possible. "That's word for word what you told me. And go figure, I made it through the entirety of the Ruins without taking a single soul." Keeping the anger out of my voice was impossible by this point. I started talking faster and faster the more riled up I got. "So by definition, my dear, _dear_ Flowey; you were wrong."

I don't know what I expected, some kind of victory forming in my gut, maybe a defeated look flashing across his face, or best case scenario, watching his petals peel off his head one by one. Instead, he snickered. "Lemme guess; you failed all your spelling tests when you were a kid, right?"

"Nope, I got ninety-fives, 'till I stopped caring." God, I wanted this damn thing to keel over and die. Or at least have any visible reaction to the insults I was chucking at him. My cool was melting, and I couldn't let him win.

"Wow, ninety-fives, huh? Impressive. You must think you're really smart, don't you?"

I flinched as his face distorted more and more, back to that hellish form with the dark, sunken eyes and razor-sharp teeth. The _real_ Flowey we all knew and despised. I wasn't afraid.

 _I'm not afraid._

"So you were able to play by your own rules," he hissed with obvious animosity. The cavern seemed to grow darker with every breath he took. "You spared the life of a single person."

I blinked. Everything was dark, and the vines were back, tearing at my flesh with their horrendous thorns. I fought back uselessly against their iron grip to save myself. But they were too strong. They pulled until my limbs were torn from their sockets in one violent motion, and I fought back a scream that curdled my blood.

My eyes were forced open again, and they were gone. Did Flowey notice my spasms? Could his sinister smile sense my...

 _I'm not afraid._

"So what?" I choked. _Stronger._ "So what?" I said again, louder, more confident. "I could do it all again if I had too. I don't care if there are three more or five thousand more monsters waiting for me." I trotted forward and leaned in, so close to Flowey he could've chomped my nose clean off if he wanted too. Close enough for him to see the beads of sweat running down my forehead. "I'm no nice-guy, but I'm not a sad, sadistic fuck like you."

A few torturous seconds past where we stayed like that. With each passing moment, the smell of his putrid breath grew stronger, the stench of soggy, rotting leaves. We waited for each other to back down. I don't know if I could've taken him in a fight right then in there, but I sure as hell knew I would've gone down kicking.

Finally, he transformed to his fake, almost innocent looking form and shifted back away from me. "Toriel was right. You really are naive, just like the others."

I tossed aside his insult like a crumpled up piece of paper. Triumph flooded every nook and cranny of my body. For now, I won.

Of course, Flowey couldn't have it so that I got the last laugh.

"Lets see how far that gets you."

With that demonic, sinister laugh ringing in my ears, Flowey sunk into the ground, taking the tension in the room with him.

...What, I said I wasn't _afraid_ , not that I wasn't nervous to hell and back.

A sigh of relief tumbled out of my mouth. The weight of a boulder had been lifted off my back.

I hated Flowey. Loathed him with every essence and fabric of revulsion and hatred in and around every corner of the universe. Never in my life had any creature driven me to such extreme emotions and scenarios in such a short period of time, and no one had every been able to catch, brush off, or throw back my attempts at jabs and insults as well as he could. My brain had instinctively marked him as my mortal enemy. Something to watch out for until I could finally claw my way out of this hellhole.

The first hurdle was cleared. It was too late to go back to Toriel. So the next step was clear.

...I had to literally take the next step.

I treaded over the spot where Flowey had been, locking the memories of Toriel, the frogs, the spider bake sale, and even Grey in the back of my mind. They would just be distractions for now.

Another gate lay in my path, this one noticeably larger than the last. A shiver ran down my spine as I drew near, not from fear, but from the damn frigid cold. I ran my hand along its surface and instantly jerked it back. Even the slightest touch from the steel was bone-chilling, enough to sting like a bee. Freezing air rushed through the gap between the two doors. The outside.

This time, I knew for a fact this was it. The end of the Ruins. Just wished the Underground wasn't negative seventy degrees Celsius.

I grabbed the handle despite the painful chill and pulled the heavy door open, ready now more than ever to brave the cold.


	9. Chapter 9: Funny Bone & Cold Shoulder

Snow. Snow blanketing the ground, snow lining the otherwise barren branches of the tall and skinny trees, snow here, snow there, snow fricking everywhere. The glistening white powder caught my eye the moment I stepped out into the cold and the door clicked shut behind me. It alienated me, as if I already hadn't felt out of place enough in the Underground. I couldn't even remember the last time I'd seen snow, if I ever had at all. Ebott certainly didn't provide with much weather variation, other than 'cold,' 'kind of hot," and 'really hot,' or on rare occasions, a drizzle of rain.

As I took my first steps onto the squishy substance and heard the soft crunching sounds under my feet, the four year old trapped inside my body immediately wanted to drop everything and start throwing together snowballs and snowmen and igloos and anything else it could think of to discover all of the wondrous fun I'd been missing out on my entire life. After all, the closest I'd come to snow had been watching other people interact with it in TV shows and movies. Little-me was burning with jealousy, and had been for a long time.

...Meanwhile, back in that sucky place known as reality, the much more rational and potent part of me was fuming and cursing the snow for soaking through my sneakers so quickly and demanded to know how the hell monsters managed to get snow and trees in the god damn Underground. Granted these weren't the first trees I'd come across, but the last one had at least been half-dead and suffering. These ones seemed very, _very_ alive, even without any foliage. Maybe it was the snow? Maybe I was just crazy?

I attempted to shrug it off and started forward again, pulling my bare arms to my chest for warmth. Every breath I exhaled appeared it front of me in a wisp before spiraling off into the open air. I'd been plucked from the stove and chucked into the freezer in some bizarre, reverse-cooking project, with nothing but my T-shirt and jeans to protect me from the chilling air. Looking on the brightside, at least there wasn't any wind chill. Although that meant next to nothing when there wasn't a giant, fiery ball hanging around in the sky to heat things up.

What was that thing called again? Oh, yeah. _THE SUN._

Damn, how long had it been since the last time I'd seen it? Somewhere around two days by now, but it felt like a lifetime. It boggled my mind how long I'd taken something so simple as seeing the sun every day for granted. For a long time, I'd pictured it as a sort of beacon or a splash of color in the blank canvas that was Ebott's sky. Even though it'd become more same-old same-old over time, I felt a little lost without it...

My hair suddenly stood up on end, and I froze. Not literally, thank God, although I'd be lying if I said it would've surprised me at this point.

I know I wasn't making it up. A twig had snapped behind me.

I was being followed.

Quietly, I slipped my toy knife and the Almighty Stick into my hands and started walking again, faster this time, ignoring the goosebumps all over my skin biting and nipping in protest. My eyes scanned the shadowy canopy for any sign of movement, but found none. I spun around as the sounds of footsteps sloshing through the snow flooded my ears, but again, I found nothing, not even an imprint in the powder other than my own.

"C-come out, c-c-c-coward," I stammered. It was a hell of a lot harder to sound threatening when your lips were frozen half-shut, and you ended up stuttering like an old cassette tape.

I listened again, more intently this time. Nothing, not even a rustle of wind.

"Aw, c-c'mon, I'm g-getting lonely out here a-all by myself. C-c-c-could use a good p-punching bag to w-warm up."

Total silence was the only response I got. Typical.

I half expected a snowball to materialize out of thin air and come hurtling at my face, but I couldn't have even been so lucky. Instead I stood there for half a minute waiting for nothing in particular to happen. You could practically hear the trees' nervous coughs and whispers. "Who is this kid talking too? Does he need help? No, like, _help_ help."

...Holy shit, maybe I _did_ need _help_ help. I'd been away from humanity only two days and I was already imagining the trees were out to get me. 'Course my surprisingly dense history with talking flora and narrowly avoiding death left me just a little bit cautious. As if anyone else who'd seen Flowey's true nature would be any better off, probably shitting themselves anytime they saw a dandelion for the next twenty years.

I took another few steps forward, weapons at the ready, and another twig snapped behind me. Whoever, or whatever, was sneaking up on me must've been new at this whole, "stealth," thing. I hadn't even noticed at sticks poking out of the snow in the first place. They literally had to be going out of their way to make sure I knew they were tailing me.

"A t-t-toddler in h-high h-heels would be stealthier than y-you," I yelled to the empty space surrounding me.

The words echoed through the eerily silent forest. Any and all sounds my pursuer was making halted.

Skeptical, but mostly just tired of freezing my ass off, I took off running further down the path. If they wanted to jump out and take a swing at my head, let 'em try. It'd be their mistake.

A few minutes went by completely devoid of any excitement, and the door to the ruins soon fell back far enough to disappear altogether. The craving for a warm fire grew stronger with each step I took, and, no matter how much I resisted and beat myself up for it, thoughts of Toriel and her warm, humble abode eventually crept back in to my mind. Sitting by the warm fire in that impossibly comfortable looking chair of hers, face stuck in one of her boring old books to lull myself to sleep, a recently emptied container that held a steaming hot cinnamon-butterscotch pie only moments before...

...Toriel's comforting presence, as she had fallen asleep at the dinner table, gentle snores calming my already tranquil as hell nerves-

"-Human."

 _Whoa._ Talk about a wake up call. The voice came so unexpectedly and so close to the back of my head I stopped dead in my tracks on impulse alone. My lack of wariness was going to get me killed.

"Y-you have t-ten seconds to back the hell off, or I'll sh-sh-shove this stick so far up your...p-places, you'll feel it for the rest of your life," I threatened in a steely voice to match my pursuer's, without turning my body. I'd have finished with "ass," but I hadn't seen it yet, and for all I knew, this monster could just be a walking potato salad or something.

A stressful four or five seconds filled the air. With each passing moment, my grip on the hilts of my weapons tightened. I was ready to spring into action at the slightest hint of movement from behind me. Should I force them into making the first move, or attack while they thought I was waiting for them to back down?

"...Oh come on, don't you know how to greet a new pal?" the voice came again, slow, harsh, and malicious like a knife across flesh, and so close I could practically feel their icy breathing down my neck.

"Three seconds left," I said as nonchalant as humanly possible. _Get ready to jump at nine._

"Turn around and shake my hand."

It wasn't a request. Unfortunately for this poor sap, I've never been one to answer kindly to requests.

 _...Wait, but if it wasn't a request...screw it, who cares?!_

Quickly, without even blinking, I spun around and simultaneously jumped back, watching the trees and snow rush by me in a blur, and putting myself at what I hoped was just the right distance to swipe at my stalker with the tip of the Almighty Stick. Without being able to see how close he was to me, I ended up misjudging the distance, and bounded way too far to do anything, looking more clueless than a horse being led into a glue factory.

I shouldn't have been too worried, judging by the appearance of my 'attacker.' They looked sullen, like they had a case of the seasonal depression, bent over with their face covered by the hood of a dark blue hoodie. At a first glance, I'd say this was the most human-like thing I'd encountered since falling into the Underground, with it's stout body, two legs, two arms, and the...shape of the top of it's head, I guess.

"Hey, no need to freak out. Just shake it...trust me."

 _Yeah, okay 'pal'. Somehow the shady outfit and the totally not-at-all threatening voice isn't doing wonders to convince me._

It slowly extended its hand out to me, (again, not threatening at all.) I could take a guess or two as to what he wanted me to do with it.

Two things immediately caught my attention. First, and the more notable of the two, his hand was bony. And I don't just mean "bony" as in you could see the outline of his bones poking out of his skin, I mean he just did away with the whole "flesh" thing altogether. Gross, but nothing too strange compared to everything else. The second made me feel dumber than a bag of rocks, smashed with a mallet, and tossed out in the rain where it would forever go without even an elementary school education.

I lowered my arms slightly, narrowed my eyes till they could pierce a speeding bullet out of the air and said, "Dude, the joke doesn't w-work if I can see the whoopee cushion between y-y-your fingers."

An awkward silence followed after I killed and gutted his attempt at humor. I'd eased up, but was still prepared to defend myself if he changed his mind and made the mistake of attacking me. Thankfully, he all he did was cut short the silence as he lifted his head.

When he spoke again, any molecule of caution left in my melted away. "Aw, but the old whoopee cushion in the hand trick is _always_ funny!"

A disturbingly big, goofy grin spread across half of his face, which was saying a lot, considering how huge it was, and the rest was all bone. Just like his fingers, he didn't seem to care much for blood, skin, and all that good stuff, only a skull such a deep white it made the snow jealous, complete with a couple of nose holes and wide eye sockets with glowing white pupils.

In any other scenario, I can say with total certainty that my shit would have been flipped like a pancake, but stuff like living skeletons sort of came second nature by now. I was numb to anything this world could throw at me. Or maybe numb from the cold, same difference.

"Yeesh, h-how l-l-long you spend six f-feet under to come o-out looking l-like that," I chattered.

He shrugged. "Not sure, it's been awhile. How about you?" The malice in his voice had vanished like the feeling in my arms. Instead, he sounded blatantly uninterested, even a little dopey, accented by his slouch and his hands folded into the pockets of his hoodie, like he couldn't care less about the human freezing his ass off in front of him. It almost bothered me more than the fact he was a living, breathing skeleton whose frigging mouth didn't even move when he spoke. The voice just seeped through the space between his teeth, but still sounded clear as day. Everything else I'd come across before had been either ready to help me, or ready to kill me at a moments notice. Even Napstablook technically attacked me, even if I basically had to coax him into it.

"Hey, kid, anyone home? Or are you experiencing a... _brain freeze_."

 _Oh for Christ's sake, just let me get hypothermia and die now._

"Another f-funny guy, eh? W-well you'd best q-quit while y-y-you're ahead," I warned, eyeing him up and down. Each observation I made of him made me less and less afraid. Short, for one thing, a whole head shorter than me at least, and chubby. How does one become a chubby skeleton? Pumping your bones full of hot air? "I've n-never lost an insult war, a-and I don't plan on i-it today. Especially t-to a w-w-walking dog magnet."

My insult didn't seem to phase him in the slightest, in fact, I swore it only broadened his grin. "You're a human, right?"

Damn, death by hypothermia had never been so appealing. "Y-yeah, and y-you're skeleton. Wanna write a b-b-b-book about it?"

"Hilarious." Without pausing, he added; "I'm Sans. Sans the Skeleton."

"Yeah, and I'm H-hank, the H-human," I scoffed, turning my back on 'Sans the sucky, skin churning, suicide-inducing skeleton.' If he was hanging around out here, there was probably another city nearby for me to warm up at, even if it meant fighting through waves and waves of more incredibly incompetent monsters. Plus the clump of trees still left me on edge with that oppressive, claustrophobic feeling, and that DAMN child-like desire to throw a snowball was really starting to get on my nerves.

"Well, H-hank, the H-human, I'd hold on a second if I were you," he called to the back of my head.

 _Just ignore him,_ I told myself.

"A-and spend another s-second out here in the d-damn snow!?" I snapped, spinning around to face him. Damn, he could not wipe that smile off his face. "I'll pass, S-sans." Then, pivoting around again, I added, as clear as I could; "And my name's not god damn 'Hank.'"

 _Well, that lasted about two seconds. Maybe next time we'll actually ignore them for a full minute before blowing up._

"C'mon kid, don't go losing your _cool_ on me already," he goaded, sliding up alongside me and falling into step, matching my pace perfectly. "Usually it takes people at _least_ a couple of minutes before my jokes drive them insane. Are all humans this stand-offish?"

 _Where's the off switch on this guy? Or self-destruct button, either would be fine._ Sans may have been right about my losing my cool, because my face felt red-hot all of a sudden. "Heh, yeah, I-I wish. Kinda was praying y-you'd be the same way."

To my surprise, he actually nodded. "Yeah, I feel you. 'Don't always like to be around people, myself."

I blinked. Surely, he wasn't sincere. He was just indulging me for the sake of getting me to listen. Well, too bad. I wasn't biting.

I pocketed my weapons and started to jog, half to lose Sans, and half to trap any trace of heat left in my body.

"Hey kid, slow down!"

Somehow, Sans was already trailing behind me, the crushing of snow beneath his footsteps my only indication of how close he was, even though I was running at a snail's pace. The snow had risen up past my ankles, drenching the bottoms of my jeans and slowing me even further, as if I was wading through a river.

"Keep up, then!" I yelled back. "Y-you gotta trudge through this sh-sh-shit all the time!" I had no way of actually knowing if he did or not, and no way of physically caring either.

A couple of minutes flew by without me paying Sans, or the world, another thought. My feet started moving without any input from my brain, and the path remained remarkably unremarkable and linear, so I allowed myself to drift off, convinced I'd lost Sans a ways back.

In a strange way, it felt good to be out running again, even in such shitty conditions. Anything semi-familiar felt refreshing by this point.

Soon, I wasn't even trudging through the snow anymore. It melted and flooded away all at once in a massive waterfall, and my feet were pounding on the cracked, rundown sidewalk, sweating from the scorching heat. Anyone who got in my way I either shoved or dashed around, depending on how likely they were to chase after and beat the living shit out of me. 'Course, ticking off the big and tough guys could be awfully exciting when you were in the right mood.

These were the only moments I could ever tolerate in Ebott, those where most of the crappiness in the city was a part of the background, and the rest was my playground. It felt oddly bittersweet to be here again, doing the things I enjoyed in a place that, no matter how hard I tried, came close to feeling like home.

Sparks went flying in my brain. _That's_ _why I need to go back,_ I realized. I had to finally perfect the route I'd been working half my life on to take me all around the city, then leave it all behind for good, once and for all, close the book on the last chapter, other random analogy.

I smiled to myself as I past by nameless person number one-thousand and sixty-three. I couldn't put my finger on it, but for whatever reason, everything felt _better_. Normally being back in Ebott would've been bittersweet, returning to a home I'd been trying to get away from, but here, I was exhilarated to be back. Maybe it was the air, cleaner than usual, or maybe it was the trees, greener than usual, or the growing speck of blue...I mean, the skeleton blocking my way, more...um...existent...than usual...

Wait, what-

"So, now that I've finally caught up with-"

"-THE HELL DID YOU-"

I panicked and stumbled, tripping over my own feet like a moron. I threw my hands out to catch myself, but there wasn't anything solid to grasp onto, and I ended up tumbling head over heels into the snow. The icy cold clawed at my face and neck, smothering me like the world's most dickish pillow.

I jumped to my feet, furiously swiping at the lingering chunks of the hellish sludge and cursed at nothing in particular. God, forget anything little me every thought or said, I wanted to be as far away from this as possible. I wanted to be back in one million degrees Fahrenheit Ebott, because any form of torture in the world was better than being near here.

"Hey, kid, _chill_ out, it's just snow."

My eyes shot open. Sans' face was suddenly the most punch-able in the entire world. Or maybe it'd always been like that. "M-make one more pun and I'll tear your spine out your asshole!"

He frowned, but his mouth never fully closed, leaving him in a bizarre open-mouthed frown. I barely noticed, though, because I was so busy being angrier than a nuclear explosion.

Sans shut up long enough for me to scrape the last of the snow of my face. It still stung, but it was bearable at least.

"...Sorry 'bout all the puns," Sans muttered. "Can't help myself sometimes. Or all the times."

I sighed, letting out a hint of my frustration through my breath. "Yeah, whatever, it's f-fine," I managed. Even though I was still angry, and freezing, and in pain, and homesick, and hated home, a.k.a. anything but fine.

I scrambled to dig up everything that'd gone flying out of my pockets during the fall. Almighty Stick, crappy toy knife, some gold coins, cellphone, and that revolting spider cider I only hung on to as a last resort. Pretty much everything I owned now, aside from the clothes on my back and any belongings I had laying around back on the surface. 'Course, that extra gold certainly couldn't hurt hanging onto. Hell, who knows. They might be my one-way ticket outta Ebott when I made it back.

"...You know, I'm actually supposed to be on the watch for humans right now," San's voice floated over. I caught him lounging against the side of a tree, one leg furled in front of the other like a...pretzel made of bone. Tasty. "But..."

"Lemme guess," I interjected just as I'd finished sorting my crap. "Y-you don't really care?"

Sans smiled at me sheepishly and folded his arms behind his head. "Heh, yeah, pretty much," he admitted. "Capturing people isn't really my style."

"Damn, you're l-lucky." I began. "On the surface, k-kidnapping people is considered 'illegal,' and, 'inhumane,' for some r-r-reason. Wonder why."

"Not much 'humane' about us down here, huh?" he said with a snicker, and a hint of something else in his voice. Anger? "Kid, it's not like we run around throwing each other into burlap sacks. That's reserved for you humans alone. Mostly."

"Looking forward to it," I mumbled. Somehow, I didn't think I could trust his word. The 'I couldn't care less' shtick was a pretty lame excuse. Toriel _had_ mentioned them needing me dead to return to the surface. Comforting. But how in the hell would killing me help them claw their way outta here? "So, h-how _exactly_ did you get in fr-front of me? Last I'd checked, I was leaving you in th-the dust."

"Preeeeety sure that's snow, not dust, kid. And besides, I know a shortcut of two around here."

I hesitated to respond. "...Alright, f-fair enough." It made enough sense he'd know this place better than I did, anyways. Although I was, or I _thought_ I was, apparently, taking the most direct path possible. Can't exactly get more direct than a straight fricking line.

"If you're keen on listening now, you should know I have a brother around here. And lemme tell ya, if you thought I was bad, he's human-hunting FANATIC."

A brother? The idea of a second assault of pun making from another skeleton sent a shiver down my spine. "So he c-cares a ton," I guessed.

"You catch on pretty quick, huh?" Sans slid off the tree and gestured further down the path that just didn't feel like ending. "He's patrolling somewhere over there. Lucky for you, I have an idea."

"Turn me in?" I suggested. Aside from Tori, this was officially the absolute fastest someone expected me to trust them. Only difference was Tori didn't come off like the kind of guy selling 'candy' to kids off the street. "'Cause if that's your b-big master plan, then quit wasting m-my time."

Sans' only immediate reply was a half-assed shrug and the same exact facial expression. "Alright, go ahead, get yourself captured," he said cheerily. "I won't try and stop you."

I nodded, waved my hand in a weak good-bye, and marched past him without a second thought. Hey, as far as I was concerned, him leaving me alone was a win for both of us. Another moment we had to put up with each other could've well lead to nuclear war.

"My bro _has_ been practicing his cooking lately." Just as I thought I was in the clear, I felt Sans' gaze burning through the back of my head. "I wonder how grilled human would taste with a bowl of spaghetti?"

Sheesh, way to turn the tables on me. It wasn't much, but the threat made me simultaneously want his help more and less somehow. Subconsciously, the though of being butchered, grilled, and served to be devoured by living skeletons and god knows what else scared the living hell out of me.

And the way he said it...

...Lets just say Sans could sound pretty intimidating when he wanted too. And the air wasn't the only thing that was icy and chilling around here.

"...F-fine, we'll do it your way," I said, effectively surrendering my soul and putting the life in the hands of...Christ, what was I getting into? "But if you get m-me killed, I'll be saving a nice, warm spot for you in Hell."

"So I get a win either way?"

 _Holy shit, I'm never getting out of here._

"Relax kid, no need to tense up like that. I'm just playing with you." I hate to admit my skin crawled as his arm grazed past mine. "Here, follow me through the gate thingy," Sans said. "My bro made the bars too wide to stop anyone."

Sure enough, we came instantly came up to a row of wood posts set up in a crappy, splintering gate, and indeed, the bars were too wide to keep anything smaller than an elephant out. If his brother was more incompetent at capturing people than a ninja with sticks of butter for limbs, was I really in desperate need of Sans' help? That would be like officers requesting back-up and deploying a tank to stop a pack of bloodthirsty jaywalkers. It seemed like overkill by that point.

Finally, the thick wall of trees parted, and we stumbled into a clearing with nothing but snow and...the weirdest lamp I'd ever seen taking up space.

"He's on his way over here. Quick, hide behind that conveniently shaped lamp!" Sans exclaimed without even the tiniest amount of worry, shoving me from behind with metric shit-tons of force.

"W-what are you-"

"-Shh. I told you to trust me right?" he countered, flashing me that same not-at-all convincing grin.

I sighed internally and ducked behind...wow, he wasn't kidding about the lamp. It'd looked strange before, but up close, it was even stranger. The shade and body of the lamp matched the shapes of my head and torso disturbingly well, as if it were made for me in this _exact_ situation. Either monsters had a weird sense of style, or...

...Did they know I was coming?

"SANS!" The shrill yet ear-shattering loud scream blasted through the icy air.

I flinched, but recovered quickly, jumping behind the lamp without anymore resistance. _That's_ _fine,_ I thought. _Didn't need that eardrum anyways._

"Sup, bro?" I heard Sans mumble.

Carefully peering out from behind my expert hiding place, I spotted a taller, thinner skeleton stomping into view. You could practically see the steam shooting out of his...well, ear-holes.

"You know what 'sup' brother!" He berated, eyes wide. "It's been eight days, and you still haven't. Recalibrated. Your. Puzzles!"

 _Oh dear god, someone shoot me now._ It took every bit of logic and reasoning I had left to keep from tearing my own ears off. This guy squealed more than a pig in a slaughter house. Not to mention he looked ready for Halloween, dressed in a bizarre half-assed knight costume.

"You hang around outside your station," he continued, tossing his bright orange scarf-cape-thingy out of his face, looking ready to launch into full rant/lecture mode. "What are you even doing?"

"Staring at this lamp," Sans said casually...Hold up, what'd he say?! "It's really cool. Do you wanna look?"

I don't know why I was so surprised. The bastard was selling me out! Maybe the passive aggressive comment about he and his brother eating me should've tipped me off sooner.

I gritted my teeth and reached for the hilt of my weapons. I was halfway there when Sans' brother spoke again.

"NO! I don't have time for that!"

I relaxed and suppressed a chuckle. The sap was literally stomping his feet in anger, like a toddler getting his toys taken away.

"What if a _human_ comes through here!?" he continued, his tantrum shattering the dreams of thousands of little snow pellets beneath his steel boots. "I want to be ready! I will be the one! I must be the one! I will capture a human!"

Jeez, I had to give this guy credit, he was certainly...passionate. He could lead a rally for pretty much any cause in pretty much anywhere without the slightest clue what he was actually talking about. I'd cast him as the staring role in a play, but the audiences' heads would probably explode by the end of the first act.

"Then I, The Grrrreat Papyrus..."

 _Welp, here we go..._

"Will get all the things I utterly deserve!" He went on to list the following on his fingers: "Respect...Recognition...Fame...And I will finally be able to join the Royal Guard!"

I sighed in relief as he paused for a brief moment, tricking me into thinking he was actually finished. 'Course not. 'The Great Papyrus' was on a frigging roll apparently.

Striking a heroic pose, he added; "People will ask, to, be my, 'friend.' I will bathe in the shower of kisses every morning!"

Sans glanced my way and winked, noting my half confused, half utterly disgusted look. He knew exactly what he was doing. "Hmm...maybe this lamp will help you."

"Sans! You are not helping! You lazybones!"

 _Oooooh, I get it._ He was playing along with Papyrus' naivety. I actually cracked a smile. Something this entertaining may just be worth freezing to death for.

"All you do is sit and boondoggle!" Papyrus accused. Yeah, I mean, Sans did strike me as quite the boondoggler, so I could let that one slide. "You get lazier and lazier everyday!"

"Hey, take it easy," Sans said, still somehow completely calm. _Right, tell him to take it easy, I'm sure that'll work on this raving lunatic._ "I've gotten a _ton_ of work done today."

A split-second pause hung in the air. I had a gut feeling something horrible was coming, something all-powerful and Earth-shattering, but I couldn't put my finger on exactly what. Unfortunately, I didn't have to wait long from behind my little hiding place to find out.

" A skele-ton."

In that one moment, it felt as though the entire universe was thinking in perfect unison. And it was heaving out a single breath of complete disappointment and disillusionment. I doubted life could ever be quite the same again after hearing such an abysmal pun, an utter disgrace of language and communication as a whole.

"SANS!"

 _Yeah, scream on, Papyrus. I'm screaming along with you on the inside._

"Come on. You're smiling," Sans insisted. I'd never wanted to punch someone in the face more than right now.

"I am and I despise it!" I ducked farther behind the lamp as Papyrus whipped his head around, sighing to the side of his head. "Why does someone as great as me have to do so much just to get some recognition..." he trailed off.

Sans perked up again, which could only bring bad things. "Sounds like you're really working yourself..."

 _Don't you fu-_

"...Down to the _bone._ "

Would throwing up give away my position? Hell, did keeping my position hidden from these idiots really matter anymore?

"Ugh! I will attend to my puzzles."

 _Thank the fricking lord!_ I wanted to yell.

"As for you and your work..."

 _Wait..._

"Put a little more..."

 _No..._

" _Backbone_ into it!" And then he tramped away back the way he came, laughing maniacally like a mad scientist on coke. "NYEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEH!"

The laughter, if you could call it that (I personally would've gone with cancer: the sound,) eventually drifted off. I lumbered out from behind my hiding place, permanently changed for the worse. I'd rather take my chances with the killer sunflower than stick around here any longer.

Sans hobbled over to me, looking terribly pleased with himself. "...So, whaddya think about me and my bro?"

I leaned in until I was inches from his face. As emotionless as humanly possible, I commanded;

"Drink. Bleach."

"Wouldn't that just give me a bleach-bone?"

"...I'm d-done with you."

"I know you're smiling too, on the inside."

I shut him out and turned away, already dreading the thought of running into Papyrus again, but it's not like I had any real alternative aside from freezing to death. Which, all things considered, might not be the worse of the two.

My gaze ended up falling on a nearby shack, run-down and...was that _blood_ staining the wood?

"Can't take your eyes off my 'sentry outpost,' huh?" _Sentry outpost?_ I wondered. _Looks more like a glorified lemonade stand to me._ "She _is_ quite the beauty."

Outside of the boards peeling off their hinges, rotting wood, and the previously mentioned various...questionable stains, I'd say it was looking pretty good. "R-right," I muttered. "And your b-brother seems like a very respectable p-person."

"He's not bad once you get to know him," Sans assured me, a slight edge to his voice.

 _Good thing I won't be here long enough for that to happen._

He pointed a lazy finger at the opening in his 'outpost.' "Got an extra hoodie in there if your interested, unless you're having fun with that little dance of yours."

I stole another glance at the shack, looked down the path and at the infinite line of snow drawn before, looked back to the shack, and nodded. "Sounds good, just one thing; Why are you helping me? And don't you _dare_ say I'm your long lost brother."

I expected him to hide or weave his way around the question, but he just shrugged and said; "What, a skeleton can't help a friend out?"

If Sans were as good at dodge ball as he was at dodging questions, we'd have a star player on our hands. You'd either have to be incredibly thick or some kind of masochist to warm up to me that quickly (I'm looking at you, Napstablook), and so far, Sans didn't seem to fit into either category too well. He was hiding something, I had no doubt about it. This time, I wouldn't be so easily fooled.

"I guess so," I lied. I could still turn down the offer, but I didn't need him to know I still didn't trust him. So I high-tailed it over to the shack, plugging my nose as I got closer to block out the awful stench of...three week old ketchup? Disgusting. Not as stomach-churning as blood, but still disgusting.

I spotted the hoodie crumpled and folded over the front, laying next to a couple of toppled mustard and ketchup bottles, thankfully not soaking in a puddle of any of the formerly mentioned condiments. Hesitant, I lifted it carefully, unfortunately having to uncover my sniffer, and examined it for anything that'd me make me throw up if I actually wore it. I spun it around, flipped it upside down, checked the pockets and hood, and turned it inside out and back again before I was finally satisfied. There was nothing but a tiny faded mustard stain on the back, which even I could deal with.

Without any other way to delay, I tossed it over myself with a sigh, surprised by just how quickly it warmed me up. It was a little too short and too big around my waist, but anything was worth not having to sputter every sentence like a dysfunctional sprinkler. Soft, too, and the extra pockets certainly wouldn't hurt.

"It looks great on you," Sans teased, his widened smile confirming that it looked absolutely terrible. Horrified, I realized we were pretty much wearing matching outfits. The sacrifices I had to make for the greater good...of myself.

"Yeah, well, it'll do for now," I whispered coldly, just low enough for him not to hear.

I faced the army of evergreen soldiers...no no, they're just trees, stop freaking yourself out with the sentient flora...faced the completely regular, not-at-all threatening trees, and took my first steps deeper into the fore-

"-Actually, hey...hate to bother ya," Sans pestered. That dude could _not_ take a hint.

"Of course you do," I said, so obnoxiously pleasant it made even me wanna throw-up.

That at least got through to him, because he scratched at the back of his skull anxiously. "Heh, sorry, but I was thinking..."

Before I could get another jab in, Sans decided to bombard me with a barrage of information, talking so fast he must've feared the world was about to explode. "My brother's been kinda down lately. He's never seen a human before, and seeing you might just make his day. You don't have to worry, he's not dangerous or anything...even if he tries to be..."

"Alright, time out," I demanded, doing that weird T-signal referees always felt the need to perform when a team called a time out. (Why did they do that anyways? Could you just blurt 'time out' into a microphone?) "You want me to risk my life entertaining the..." I cut myself off before finishing with 'poor bastard.' "...Jolly old soul? Just to cheer him up?"

Sans shrugged lamely. "Yep, pretty much."

Normally, I would've laughed, spat in his face, and moseyed on down the path with a spring in my step and without another thought. ...Okay, maybe not spit in his face, but the point still stands. He wanted me to waste _more_ time with that annoying psycho he called a brother? That laugh, those freak-outs...that scarf...I don't think I could tolerate it even if I tried. Didn't he mention something about recalibrating puzzles? As if I didn't have to jump through enough hoops already to get out of here.

And yet, for some reason I couldn't explain...maybe Tori had rubbed off on me, and that tiny glimmer of a good person inside of me had turned infectious, or it was that impeccable charm Sans definitely, absolutely, totally, not at all sarcastically had in that smile, because as much as I wanted too, I couldn't say no. Sans was annoying, sure, but compared to his brother - who was in the combination category for sure - he might as well be a life-long friend. Plus he gave me a free hoodie, and I was heading towards Papyrus no matter _what_ I did, so I suppose going a little out of my way and resisting the urge to slap the stupid out of Papyrus' skull wasn't the worst idea in the world. Who knew, Sans could turn out to be valuable for more than just acting as that one creepy uncle who shows up twice a year, gives you a present, and then disappears never to be seen again.

"...Alright, I'll throw the guy a _bone_." _Dammit, now I'm doing it..._

Sans' face lit up like a flamethrower. "Thanks a million. I'll be up ahead." With that, he did as he said and went up ahead...or, rather, he sauntered off in the complete wrong direction. Hey, whatever works. This guys probably had shortcuts and secret passage ways out the ass.

NOW, I started down the path free of any other interruptions, a bubbling feeling in my stomach. "I better not regret this..."


	10. Chapter 10: Icy Path

Ever since I was a little, clueless kid, I had found it hard to believe there was anything past the sky. Now that I was older, I wasn't oblivious to the existence of space or other solar systems and galaxies or any of that crap, but the dim sky blues and the murky grays the atmosphere projected always seemed so...final, like the wall of a prison cell. But here, in the Underground, the feeling was only amplified to be more constricting, as if it were tightening the noose around my neck. I was looking upwards at a sky I knew with utmost certainty ended, one that remained dark as twilight, unmoving and unchanging.

I hadn't realized it until now, but the moment I left the Ruins, the world randomly felt the need open up and stop looking like the Underground, from the surplus of trees and snow to the sky itself. The very top of the cavern wasn't a low-hanging ceiling nearly scraping the top of my head anymore, but an ocean of dark-blue towering far above me. The first time I noticed it, my thoughts actually wandered off the cold. It almost felt like a replica, an attempt at reconstructing the sky I'd come to know on the surface. And no, that didn't make me feel any less trapped.

Sure, it was at least more spacious than the caverns I'd explored, even with the mixture of tall jet black and evergreen trees packed so tightly together you could've mistaken them for a massive fence at first glance, but that didn't change anything. It was still a hindrance, and not to mention a cheep knock-off of the _real_ sky.

I sighed and kicked at the snow in frustration. Fake. It all felt so fake, like a washed out painting, or a mirage in the desert. An illusion the monsters had created with their magic doo-dads and the what-nots and the bippity-boppity-bullcrap. If I stared hard enough at the haze, my gaze pierced the blue apparition, and the stalactites ducking beneath its shadow became clearer than day.

Something else about it was tugging at my thoughts as well. Why would they go to the trouble of making their world look as much like ours as possible? It came off as pathetic, like they had accepted they would never return to the surface, and figured mimicking it was their next best option. If you had the potential and freedom to use your fancy magic and make the sky look like anything you want, why not make it something you couldn't find anywhere else? Why not give it its own identity, like a solid blood red or pink polka dots with white stripes or any combination of colors you could think of? Why-

"-Ow!" I yelped as something hard smacked into the back of my head, nearly knocking me off my feet. I recovered my balance quickly, despite the weight of the snow at my feet pulling me down, and spun around to find out what the hell had hit me. It may be about time for me to stop thinking so much and actually focus on the creatures relentlessly trying to kill me.

"You're gonna regret...that..." I trailed off, eyes widening. My mind was having trouble comprehending the monstrosity sprawled out before me. How the actual living hell did I not notice this abomination while passing by it a minute ago?

"Ice puns are _snow_ problem, you know!" it cried, launching waves of crescent shaped projectiles at me.

I was almost too stunned by its appearance to react. The best words I could come up with to describe it were 'snow chicken,' and even that didn't do it much justice. It stood a few yards back at about the same height as me...assuming that... _thing_ jutting out of its beak was actually a part of its face. It was either that, or a terrifying mask shaped vaguely like a snow-flake. Pile all that on top of the body, legs, feathers, and talons of a chicken with teeth that looked sharp enough to tear my head clean off, and you got...whatever the hell this thing was. Oh, and a pun somehow even worse than Sans', which wasn't exactly an easy feat.

I side-stepped the new and improved friendliness pellets as they whizzed past my face, moving fast enough that I felt cold wind rush by as the air split behind them. Thank the big snow chicken in the sky they weren't real razor blades, or I'd be sprawled out on the ground, painting the snow red. Once I'd finally begun to get over how strange it looked, I scowled at the beast, grabbing the Almighty Stick and toy knife.

"..." Dammit, why was I having such a hard time coming up with an insult to start the fight? Maybe this thing was such a mess they all seemed way too easy or obvious. Or it's big, beady eyes nervously eyeing me up and down were cutting off the blood flow to my brain. I eventually settled on something simple, and, coincidentally, the first coherent sentence that popped into my head; " _Ice_ to meet you, but I must be...snowing _..._ now."

...

...

 _Alright, new theory. Let's just attack him...her...it, whatever, and then never speak again. Please._

I ran at my attacker, extra careful to duck under and jump over his flurries of projectiles instead of rolling as usual, solely to keep from flopping around in the freezing snow. Once I was close enough, I took a running leap, launching off of any traction I could gather from the ground, and whacked it across the beak with the brunt of the stick.

I expected some kind of grunt or cry of pain, but since the universe didn't feel like being normal right now, that didn't happen. Instead, KFC's new winter mascot let loose something between a squeal and a shriek from its beak.

"W-what'd you go and do that for?" It squawked, flailing its wings around wildly, like a chicken without a...oh, right.

For a moment, I had trouble deciding whether I was angry, or confused all over again. "The hell are you talking about!?" I demanded, settling on angry, and discarding my promise not to speak again. " _You_ attacked _me_!"

"I didn't attack nobody!"

For the second time in two minutes, I was left nearly speechless. Why did stupid people always feel the need to challenge the obvious? "You beamed me in the back of the head with...whatever the hell that was. Don't try and lie to me, mother-clucker, or the next one's going right down your throat!" I yelled, shoving the Almighty Stick right in his face for him to get a good look.

Was I overreacting a little bit? Probably. Did I care?

 _Hahahahaha, good one._

Meanwhile, the grim reality of the situation finally seemed to dawn on Snowchicken as a sullen look overcame his...for convenience sake, lets keep calling it a face. "I-I just wanted someone to listen to my jokes, you know...?"

I blinked awkwardly. The sheer stupidity of that statement caused, yet again, a malfunction in my brain. This dude was a walking brain-cell-popper. "So you tried to beat me unconscious!? Dude, the creepy stalker freaks usually take at _least_ a week before they start kidnapping."

"I ain't no kidnapper!" He protested, stomping the ground in frustration. "It's just...you know, whenever I try my out puns on anyone else, they make fun of me and walk away." It gazed at me...longingly? Way to turn this situation even creepier than it already was, dude. "I figured, you know, since you're new around here, you might...you know, listen..."

"You know?" I added obnoxiously, turning to leave. Could you blame me? I didn't exactly ask for this sap's entire life story, and it clearly wasn't worth my time.

"But then, I thought to myself," he babbled on. "'No way Snowdrake, you're crazy! He'll just ignore you!'" _Well, at least he got that part right._ "You gotta keep a captive audience, you know?" It stumbled along beside me, staring into my soul, practically begging for attention. Naturally, I didn't even glance his way. I was trying my absolute hardest not to hear him, yet I couldn't resist the urge to fire back.

"You could've just asked, _you know,"_ I said calmly.

"Really? You mean it?"

"Yeah." I smiled at him. "I would've said no, but you still could've asked."

He shot me a look as if I'd told him his grandmother was in the hospital and did a complete one-eighty, sauntering off back the way we came. I planted my feet in the snow for a moment to watch him go. His head hung so low that his beak actually scraped against the powder, but I still didn't pity him in the slightest. After all, he did just try and use force to keep me as his captive audience...

...So, if I wasn't concerned with him getting a chuckle out of someone anytime soon, why couldn't I peel my eyes off him?

The answer hit me like a friendliness pellet to the face.

I cupped my hands together and called after him. "Hey, Snowdrake, hold up a sec!"

The instant my voice assaulted his eardrums, he spun around and his expression lit up in fireworks. Sucker probably thought I was calling him back for an encore. "Yeah, what is it?" He said, trying and failing to mask the excitement in his voice with annoyance.

I skipped right to the point, practically interrogating the poor bastard. "You said the only reason you attacked me was to get me to listen to your dumb snow puns, right?"

The fireworks in his eyes fizzled out without a bang, leaving only the smoke and disappointment. "Oh...uh-huh..." he mumbled.

 _Interesting._ "So...there's no way in hell you were looking to take my soul?" I asked casually.

"WHAT?!" It screeched, shattering the otherwise silent forest. I slammed my hands over my ears. The scream was so loud you could visibly see the pine trees' needles rustling. "Where did that come from?! You think I'm some kind of...of...of soul thief?"

 _Well that certainly snapped him out of it._ "...So you _don't_ know I'm human..." I muttered under my breath, too quietly for him to hear. _No, that's impossible. They'd notice my..._

I glanced down at my chest, eyeing the glowing red heart popping out of the front my hoodie. My soul. None of the monsters I'd seen wore their heart on their sleeve like I did, so I figured it would just be a dead giveaway. A neon sign glowing on the side of a skyscraper in Vegas, screaming, "HUMAN! HUMAN!" to any monster looking for a tasty snack. I knew for a fact they could see it, too. After all, Toriel had made that god-awful heart pun when we first met.

Actually, forget about the Soul, shouldn't they already _know_ what humans looked like if their entire race was hunting for them!? Sans at least seemed to have that down, and Snowdrake over there was at least intelligent enough to crack a pun, so what was the deal? Granted, Sans _was_ supposedly a sentry on the look out for humanity...

"Forget it!" Snowdrake scattered my thoughts, flapping his wings in the single most irritating fashion possible. "I'll take my puns elsewhere! I ain't taking insults and accusations from somebody who don't know the first thing 'bout comedy, you know?"

With, that, he turned and started to stomp off.

"But you said _everyone_ was giving you shit for your jokes!" I protested, but he'd already disappeared behind the nearest evergreen. Good riddance, I guess? At least the trees couldn't complain when his ice puns crashed and burned...and melted.

Moments later, I shook off the strange encounter, and found myself trudging forward again, following the only marked path I could find. I didn't dare start running, worrying I'd space out again and sprint headfirst into a trap.

For some reason, the idea that the majority of the monsters may not even know I'm human chipped away at my remaining brain cells. Were my enemies that really that incompetent? Could I just waltz forward and be back "home" in time for supper? On the other hand, maybe I was wrong, and Snowdrake was just one in a million. On the grotesque third hand, he may have been a spy, and was heading back to organize an ambush. I urged myself to be a little more aware at that thought, since by this point, anything was possible.

And if the first were true and only a handful of them could tell the difference between a human and a rock with googly eyes, I could always try and milk some help out of 'em.

"...As I was saying about Undyne..."

Oh god, was that Papyrus' voice? Already? I couldn't help but mutter; "Speaking of incompetence..."

I slowed down until my steps were nearly silent, or as silent as they physically could be with the constant aggravating sounds of ice crunching beneath my feet, and crept up beside the nearest tree.

...Then the needles starting digging into my face and I canned the idea of stealth, throwing myself out into the open with an annoyed grunt. What's the worst they could do to me anyways? Have Paps scream at me till I fell over dead?

 _Yikes_. I shuddered. On second thought, maybe I should've stayed hidden.

Tweedledee and Tweedledum, or Sans and Papyrus (yes, in that order,) turned to investigate the sound. I stared back at them confidently, almost chuckling the look of shock corrupting Papyrus' face, and the...static nonchalant expression on Sans' face.

"S-S-S-S-SANS!" His hand shot out and latched onto Sans' shoulder like a crane, yanking him around so their backs were turned to me.

I rolled my eyes as Papyrus' not-so-quiet whispers floated over. "Oh my god! Is that...A human!?" He whipped back around, teeth chattering with anxiety. I smirked back at him and waved, half hoping for and half dreading another one of his freak outs.

...Wait, why the hell were they peering _around_ me?

"Uhhhh..." Sans muttered, sounding even more brain-dead that usual. "Actually, I think that's a rock."

"...Oh."

I dropped my hand to my side and let out a grunt of frustration. Figures they'd enjoy staring at rocks so much. After all, family had to stick together, right?

Cupping my hands around my mouth, I yelled; "Over here, ass-hats!"

That finally got their attention. Papyrus' gaze shifted over to me, and his face somehow turned an even paler shade of white than usual.

"OH MY GOD!" _Yep, should've stuck to sneaking around._ His voice was actively pounding the shit out of my ears. "Is...is _that_ a human?"

"Yes." Sans said confidently.

"OH MY GOD! Sans, I finally did it!"

 _Did it? Congratulations, you successfully looked at a human for the first time._ "Yeah, but that was just the easy part!" I argued, staring the two down like it was high noon in the wild west.

Looking at the two skele-bros side-by-side, they couldn't have seemed less related. Next to his brother, San's slouch only seemed more intense, and he was already only half Papyrus' height. Sans mumbled everything while Papyrus shrieked at the top of his...lungs (maybe?), one dressed like a confused cosplayer and the other managed to crawl out of the house looking semi-normal, etcetera, etcetera. The only similarity I could think of off the top of my head is their uncanny ability to piss people off. Even then, that might just be a me thing, and the hell did I know?

"Undyne will..." Papyrus ranted, so infatuated with himself he ended up ignoring my comment entirely. "I'm gonna...I-I'll be so...POPULAR!"

I eyed Sans, looking as apathetic as possible. "Does he need help?" All the poor skeleton could offer back was a shrug.

Papyrus cleared his...spine, before shooting me a determined glare. "Human!" He began, pointing a bright non-threatening gloved hand at my face. "You shall not pass this area!" Striking a 'heroic' pose, he added; "I, The Great Papyrus, will stop you!"

Meanwhile, I was pretending to check my fingernails, drilling it into his skull that he didn't intimidate me in the slightest. "Right. And then pigs will fly, double rainbows will flood the skies, and I'll give a shit about anything you're screaming at me."

Papyrus looked totally stumped. "Eh...what did the human say?"

Once again, Sans was ready to step in an answer for him. "She means that you don't scare her."

"WHAT?!" Papyrus and I shouted in unison. Whatever the hell was pissing _him_ off, I was fuming over the 'she' and 'her' part!

"If that was not enough to frighten you, may I add that I will then CAPTURE YOU! YOU WILL BE DELIVERED TO THE CAPITAL! THEN. THEN!

"...I'm not sure what happens next."

I shook my head. _Worry about that later, we need to finish putting this kid to bed._ "Oh, the capital, huh?" I teased, making it sound as important as possible. "And you're gonna roll out the red carpet for me, too, I presume?"

"SANS! The human still refuses to make any sense!" he barked, stomping his feet in annoyance. This time, he didn't even give his brother a chance to respond. Instead he whipped around to face me and chanted; "In any case, continue...only if you dare!"

I choked out at a sigh of relief as the maniac ran off cackling like the Wicked Witch of the West. Fingers crossed he'd melt if I tossed a bucket of water on him.

With him gone, I turned on Sans. "So what the hell is with this 'she' bullshit?"

Sans looked completely clueless. "What?"

"Oh nothing. Except _I'm a dude_." I said indignantly.

He raised an...eye socket at me. Christ, remembering skeleton anatomy and all the laws of physics being broken was beginning to get mentally taxing. "Really?"

"Yes!" I insisted, feeling my face grow flushed against my will.

He scanned my body from head to toe, eye sockets glowing with disapproval. "...Keep telling yourself that, bud."

I prepared to launch into a rant defending my appearance, but cut myself short. Arguing with Sans didn't seem very worth it. I had a feeling I couldn't change his opinion, no matter how much I berated him with mine.

He must've noticed my defeat, because he kept talking with the same smug expression. "Anyways, you could probably already guess this, but you really won't have to sweat any of the traps my bro can throw at you. Especially with me here to keep an eye socket out for ya."

I nodded. _As if I need your help._ "Whatever, just run ahead and make sure your brother doesn't trip and bust his skull open on a...pebble, or something."

He winked at me, once again obliterating any knowledge I had about the anatomy of a skull, and sauntered off to chase after his brother.

Once he'd vanished deeper in the forest, I let out a loud, contented sigh I'd been holding in since approaching the the two not-so spooky scary skeletons. They were admittedly exhausting to 'talk' to. Every insult, threat, or whatever the hell Papyrus thought he was talking about I threw back at them felt like a mountain I had to climb over, with nothing but my bare words. Still...there was some joy to be found in poking fun at people who rarely understood the joke. It was like gambling away expired coupons, they're weren't really any repercussions no matter which direction it headed in. Even battling Sans for victory over the pun and insult wars was a hurdle, but not one... _too_ agonizing to jump. At least, compared to 'Papyrus the Mighty,' or whatever he'd called himself before.

I followed after Sans and Papyrus' footprints in the snow, as if I had any real choice. I might as well be Dorothy with my ruby-red slippers glued to the yellow brick road, except with no dog, scarecrow, tin man, or lion to keep me company. Just two annoying animate skeletons who showed up whenever they felt like it, and of course the Almighty Stick. Not that I was complaining about traveling (for the most part) alone. Toriel's advice and her constant worrying had grown tiring before long when I journeyed with her, and even though I had looked forward to reuniting with her further down the road, I wasn't exactly exuberant at the idea of her following me around, or hell, just hanging around others in the first place. It was more so the mind numbing boredom and tedium than anything else making me wish someone else would show up.

God, who else but me could stumble into a nest full of weird undiscovered monsters, constantly fight for their life, and somehow come out feeling bored? Maybe I was spoiled after getting attacked straight out of the gate, so now every moment of downtime felt like coming down off a sugar high.

Of all things, a bland signpost the color of mud managed to break up the monotony. "Absolutely no moving..." I read aloud. _Well, that's one less rule I have to follow today. Unless they left a teleporter lying around, in which case I'll gladly oblige._

Going back to my usual affair of ignoring strange signposts left out in the middle of nowhere...actually, scratch that, I usually read them the first time passing through...

So going back to my usual affair of ignoring strange signposts left out in the middle of nowhere _after_ reading them, I took one step farther in the snow-

"-Did something move?" came a shady sounding voice.

I tensed up. _Hey, would ya look at that. Something._

A shack almost identical to the two I'd passed, the first for Sans and the second, I presumed, for Papyrus, stood in front of me. Apparently the skele-bros weren't the only sentries stationed around here.

The slim head of a dog emerged from the opening, eyes sharp as a dagger, and staring straight at me.

I didn't even have enough time to move before he spoke again. "Was it my imagination?"

My hand rested uneasily on my pockets, fingers clenched tighter than a clam shell. The hell was it waiting for? And invitation to come slaughter me?

He jumped out of the post feet-first, a slender anthropomorphic dog, skinnier than a toothpick after a run in with a piece of sandpaper, with a short sword in each paw. A bead of sweat admittedly ran down my forehead at the sight of the blades. They looked sharp enough to kill, way more threatening than any other weapon drawn at me, even Toriel's fire or - god forbid - Snowdrake's puns.

"Because, if something _did_ move..." he continued in a low, steely tone. "For example, a human...I'll make sure it NEVER moves again."

Just as the last bark was spat from his mouth, he leaned back on its haunches and leapt at me, the tip of his swords pointed right at my throat.


	11. Chapter 11: Piece of Me

_Funny how your mind can be racing at the speed of light while everything around you seems frozen._

I have no idea what chunk of insanity corrupted my brain and possessed me to stay perfectly still with a pair of swords swinging wildly at me, inches away from tearing through my flesh like butter, but whatever it was, I'd never felt smarter in doing something so amazingly stupid.

The dog's leaping attack _just_ missed me. One of his blades came so close to my neck I felt it brush up against each individual strand of hair in its way. Every instinct I had screamed at me to jump out of the way, or turn tail and run, or grab my weapons and try to fight back. But I didn't.

After the mangy mutt realized he'd met with nothing but open air, he stood up and took another look around with that piercing gaze of his. I tensed up as his gaze past right over me. "Nothing. Must've been my imagination. Again."

 _What am I, chopped liver?_ I knew I was good at blending into the background, but this was ridiculous! Who the hell hired a sentry with the sole purpose of...sentry-ing, that couldn't even see a few feet in front of-

"-Wait, what was that!?' Pupper's head jerked to the side, and any threatening notion in his gaze vanished in favor of immeasurable amounts of awe. I followed his gaze carefully, without turning my own head, and spotted a hint of movement out of the corner of my eye. It turned out to be a pine cone slipping of the branches of one of the trees, tumbling into the snow bank below.

I frowned. So...the overgrown chihuahua _did_ have a pair of eyes that worked, he was simply more entertained by the most boring event to ever occur in nature than the creature from another world he was ordered to kill.

"Damn, only a pine cone..." he muttered word for word what I was thinking. His poise became much more relaxed. "I could've sworn I saw something _moving_..."

Now that caught my attention. I felt like a ninja, hiding in plain sight while I observed my target, looking for any and all weaknesses while carefully plotting my next move. Only here, I didn't have to make even an attempt at staying hidden. Doggo, as the plaque drilled into the side of his sentry station read (really creative name there, by the way. Next you'll be telling me the mutant frogs hanging around the Ruins were called "Froggits" or something.) could only see things that were moving. Either that or he was lulling me into a false sense of security and coincidentally had some weird pine cone fetish.

Doggo began to saunter back to his post, not bothering to hide his disappointment at coming up empty-pawed, oblivious to the fly on the wall behind him. I couldn't help but crack a smile, slowly, to keep from alerting him to my presence. Now _I_ had complete control over the situation.

And it wouldn't exactly be like me to ignore a position of power, now would it?

With painstakingly sluggish movements rivaling a sloth on the dance floor, I pulled out The Almighty Stick, got into a throwing position, then threw caution to the wind as well as the stick as I chucked it as hard as I could.

As I'd expected, Doggo whipped around the moment the unabated flying object left my grasp. "HUH!?" he cried with a mixture of joy and surprise. "A FUN STICK APPE-"

Whatever he was screaming about was silenced as The Almighty Stick hurtled through the air, smacking him square in the snout with a loud _thonk!_ It hit hard enough to knock him off his feet, and send his swords flying from his hands on to the snow.

Doggo's yelps of pain as he rolled around on the ground were drowned out only by my laughter. The creature who had me at death's door less than a minute ago was now rolling around in the snow and dirt like a...well, like a dog. And the real cherry on top? I hadn't even been aiming for him. I threw the stick figuring his canine instincts would kick in, and he'd bound off to chase after it. Although, this certainly worked just as well, if not even better.

I didn't hang around too much longer in case Doggo decided to get up and use his big, scary letter openers to chop me up and serve my bits and pieces on a kebob. I stopped over his pathetic snow-covered form on my way out to admire my handiwork, and to snatch up The Almighty Stick, which had come through for me once again.

The last thing I heard from Doggo as I hurried past was him yelling out between whimpers; "I'm gonna need some dog treats after this!"

Smiling widely as I made my getaway, I raised up the Almighty Stick up to my face. "Way to take one for the team," I praised, stooping over to wash some of the saliva off in the snow. It was only after I'd finished cleaning it the best I'd could and had been jogging for a full minute that I ran straight into a brick wall. I realized the game-changing mistake I'd made.

"Ah, dammit, I should've grabbed his swords!" How in the hell had I forgotten about them!? Those things were way more threatening than anything else the monsters had thrown at me, and when the perfect opportunity came along to steal them for myself, I completely disregarded them in favor of my god damn stick.

 _Yeah, you really came through for me again._ I thought about doubling back to try and take them, but brushed off the idea. Doggo would probably be ready for me If I tried anything a second time.

When I moved too slow, I was manipulated. When I tried to pick up the pace, I missed out on the most obvious bullcrap. No matter how well I played my cards, it seemed like I was always being dealt a bad hand!

"Hey, kid!"

I tensed up and stopped dead in my tracks, expecting Doggo to burst from the trees screaming at the top of his lungs with swords drawn, until I recognized the voice as Sans'. Letting out a sigh of relief, I nodded to acknowledge the grinning skeleton's presence. He must've used one of those totally-not-suspicious secret shortcuts of his, because I hadn't noticed him standing right beside me a moment ago.

"Thanks for warning me about the half-blind dog flailing around with dual swords like nobody's buisness. Really appreciate the heads-up. Please don't hesitate to do so _again_ ," I said coldly, glaring at Sans' unwavering expression. No sign of guilt emerging anywhere.

Sans shrugged. " _Cut_ me some slack, I already have a skele-ton of stuff on my mind."

"...You're literally just gonna squeeze in puns anywhere you can, aren't you?"

He winked at me, a gesture sending more worry than assurance. "Now that I know ya can handle them, yeah. But hey!" He cut me off before I got a chance to say anything, probably noticing my _I swear to God I'll build a castle out of your bones_ death-glare. "I feel bad about not telling ya Doggo was back there, so how 'bout I make it up to you?"

I raised a tentative eyebrow. If it was an in depth look into the delicate art of pun-crafting, I could probably live without. "Depends. What'd you have in mind?" I asked, not bothering to hide my suspicion. Nor did I bother to remind the skeleton he'd already given me one of his hoodies for nothing in return. After all, he wasn't the on in a life-or-death situation.

"You wouldn't happen to know about blue attacks, would ya?"

I frowned. "Pretty sure that's just what people call it when a member of the Blue Man Group is charged for sexual assault."

"...No?" Sans assured me with the confidence of a salmon fighting a grizzly bear. "Never mind. So, when monsters attack you, they usually shoot some white gunk at you, right?"

"Yeah? So?" I shivered as another blast of cold air pushed past. The hoodie certainly helped, but it was so freezing I could probably be caring the sun in my pocket and still shiver every few seconds.

"Well, some of 'em, my bro included, will use blue attacks. And those, pal, are not fun," he warned. "If you see a blue attack, don't move and it won't hurt you."

I zipped and unzipped the top of my hoodie absentmindedly, not totally convinced Sans was telling the truth. "Don't move? And you're not just saying that to get me killed, right?

He smiled. "Please, you wouldn't need my help for that."

I scoffed at his comment. "I've been doing just fine on my own."

"Oh really? Who's jacket is that on your back, exactly?"

 _Shit, he did remember._ "...Alright, fine. You got me," I admitted, avoiding his gaze. That was easily one of the hardest things I'd ever had to do in my life. I could've easily just denied it to save my sorry ego, but my rational side kept beating it over my head that I'd get myself killed if I rejected any and all help that wanted to waltz with me. Sans probably had a breaking point, too, and if I pissed him off enough to feed me false information...hell, he could be doing it already...I could end up feeding the ground.

So, I decided to play along with his puns and his condescending tone for as long as I could. At least he could take a joke, otherwise I might have to tape my mouth shut just to get out of this place in one piece.

"...Sorry for being an asshole." I added begrudgingly, talking out of the corner of my mouth.

Sans nodded. "Don't sweat it, kid. I wouldn't take me seriously either."

I chuckled at that. "Glad to have my life in your metacarpal." On the inside, I screamed _just kill me now._

"Your bone jokes are givin' me osteonecrosis ," he countered.

"...Nope, didn't get that one."

"Eh, worth a shot."

Sans kept chatting away, advising me that the best way to remember to stop whenever I see a blue attack was to imagine the them as blue stop signs. (Thanks for that, Sans. I'll have fun trying to tear that distracting image outta my head.) After that, we said our goodbyes, and he disappeared into the trees, promising he'd catch up. _Maybe he has a secret underground network of tunnels,_ I thought as an explanation for how he was everywhere at once. _Man, how much cooler would Ebott be if it had one of those..._

I gasped as my feet slipped out from under me. My arm shot out to catch myself as I fell forward, face quickly approaching the ground, and I landed hard on my knees and the palms of my hands.

Grunting in anger and, I spat, "Agh, dammit! What the hell was-"

I paused when I noticed the surface I'd slipped on, a flat patch of solid ice, hard as brick and thick enough that I couldn't see any sort of movement below it's shadowy surface. Despite the pain flooding my knees, which I had no doubt were starting to look like an old prune baking out in the sun for twenty years, I attempted to climb to my feet.

Easier said than done. Standing up on ice was already like trying to balance on a thin beam coated in butter, on fire, above a pit of man-eating lions, with heavy metal blaring at full volume in your ears, and I'd never exactly had any practice with it before. It never really got cold enough for water to freeze in Ebott, even if there _were_ any bodies of water to walk on, and there weren't any skating rinks to fill the void, either. I nearly fell three more times just trying to stand up, let alone when taking my first steps.

I made my way off the ice, taking one tortuously slow step after the other, until I was able to hop back onto the snow with a sigh of relief. Never thought I'd prefer trudging through the snow to walking on anything else. I wonder if Sans had a pair of ice skates I could take off his hands...

A short way forward, the path split for the first time since the Ruins, one leading forward, and the other, thinner one heading off to the side. I chose the latter first, the wrong way. And the only reason I knew it was wrong was that it looked right, which rarely seemed to be working for me. I'd probably choose wrong even if I was following the yellow brick road.

It was a short detour at least, ending pretty much just as it started. The path opened up over a ledge overlooking an eerie pit of absolute nothingness, with a single lonely snowman standing over the cliff's edge.

I eyed it strangely. Much like the snow itself, the snowman felt utterly unreal and alien to me, like a talking flower or an anthropomorphic dog, something I'd only ever glimpsed on TV. That being said, it wasn't exactly as glamorous as Frosty, not even in the same ballpark. It had only a lazy smile carved into it's top mound of snow, a couple of small black bits of coal for eyes and buttons for the...buttons, complete with the only thing snowmen couldn't live without; an old, withered carrot nose. I guess everything looked better when you saw it on TV. Hell, it's bottom layer of snow was so melted and mushy it was a wonder the unrealistically happy piece of snow was still standing.

Much like Ebott's economy.

Once I was content with my observations, and by content I mean pissed that yet another part of my childhood had been gutted, I sighed and turned to leave.

"Are you a human, traveler?"

 _Figures. Seems like everything that's got a mouth has something to say down here._

Typically, I'd glance around at the trees and in search of the obvious source of the voice, but it really didn't take a detective by this point to figure out it'd come directly from the snowman.

"Depends," I shot back. "You got a switchblade hidden somewhere in those lumps? Of snow!?" I added quickly, realizing how...lets say weird the first part sounded.

"Oh no, nothing of the sort," the snowman's voice floated over, so quiet I could barely hear it over my own thoughts. It's mouth strangely didn't move when it spoke, although even that wasn't new or surprising to me anymore. "I was...just...curious."

I nodded. "That all? I'll be going, then."

"No, wait!" the snowman called out before I'd taken even my first step. I eyed him suspiciously, trying to read what he was thinking.

The snowman cleared his throat with the sound of gargling snow, and spoke more quietly. "S-sorry to yell at you, but I'm not very familiar with your kind."

"Can't say I've seen a talking snowman myself." The snowman chuckled at that. "So what do you want?"

The moment I actually asked him to speak, he was suddenly at a loss for words. "...Well...you see..."

"Spit it out already! I could just as easily be freezing my ass off somewhere else," I pressed. It felt odd talking to something that couldn't so much as bat an eyelash, like trying to hold a conversation with a scarecrow. Or the elderly.

"...As you can probably tell by looking at me, I'm frozen to this very spot," it explained.

 _Oh great, a sob story. My favorite pastime; listening to other complain._

"And...well...how do I put this..." it rambled, searching for the right words. Finally, with a new sense of confidence, and - I swear on it - a glint to its unmoving coal eyes, it said, "I want to see the world."

...

...

"...You and me both, pal."

"Well, unlike me, you can!" It was if a spark had ignited in that old pile of snow, and it started talking faster and faster. Even the trees seem to come alive at his speech, with a gust of wind spurring their bristles, causing them to sway in time with his words. "Those legs of yours could take you here, there, anywhere you want! All the sights and landmarks this vast world of ours has to offer! And so, kind madam..."

...Sounded like it was finally about to get to the point.

"I ask that you take a small piece of me with you. So that we may experience all those wonders together."

What did this guy take me for, some raving lunatic? I already had enough on my plate just trying to survive in this insane world, there was no reason to add yet another burden onto my back. As if there were any other choice but-

"I'll do it." The chorus of wind stopped. "And it's sir, not madam."

For a moment, it felt like the world had come to a screeching halt, mouth gaping open at my madness. "...Sir, words cannot describe the amounts of gratitude and happiness I am feeling right now. Truly, thank you. Now please, reach in and take a piece from my abdomen, and store it in the bottle by my feet."

I complied immediately, as if in a trance, walking up beside the snowman, fishing the snow covered bottle out, pulling off the cap, and reaching into his center to pull out a fair sized chunk of his body despite the stinging sensation in my hands. I half-worried I'd cause him to collapse, but he stood his ground firmly. I sealed the snow piece within the bottle and carefully stuffed it into my hoodie's front pocket.

I didn't know how taking an inanimate piece of him would help him see the world.

I didn't know why I cared.

Maybe I really was crazy.

I knew for a fact I didn't care.

"Good luck on your adventures, my friend," the snowman sang. Even though I knew its mouth hadn't moved, the grin on its face seemed ten times wider.

I nodded and left without another word, suddenly needing to get back to the surface more than ever before.


	12. Chapter 12: Ice is Nice

"You're so lazy! You were napping all night!"

"...I'm pretty sure that's called sleeping, bro."

I barely heard the two brothers arguing, or more accurately Papyrus' screaming contest with himself and Sans' occasional one-liner, feeling a lot more distant than before. _Why did you take it?_ I nagged myself, tempted to pull out the snow-filled bottle. _And more importantly, why haven't you tossed it yet?_ I didn't have time to be getting all mushy-gushy with the locals, especially not with the semi-well dressed mound of ice. I should've just chucked the snow piece into the thick woods the moment I was out of sight. It's not like he'd ever know the difference.

What was wrong with me? I could shoot down Snowdrake's puns and leave him stomping away in fury without feeling any remorse myself, I could smack the crap out of frogs and take the money they drop right off the ground without so much as a ping of guilt, so what made this snowman so special? Nothing. Nothing at all.

And yet, I couldn't bring myself to leave the insignificant snow piece behind. A distracting sense of sympathy crowded and beat out my better judgement, no doubt the byproduct of spending time with Toriel. The poor snowman's desires lined up with mine, so, no matter how much I denied it, I felt inclined to help out any way I could.

Or maybe...maybe taking the snow piece had nothing to do with appeasing the snowman's desires. Maybe it was a promise. Not to him, not to Tori, but to myself. As long as I kept it with me, it was a reminder that one day, I _would_ escape the Underground, and I _would_ leave Ebott and explore the outside world, with this little jar of ice as my shining, glistening...in all honesty, pretty lame trophy. But it was _my_ lame trophy, and...and...

...I mean, the stick was pretty cool too, right?

"Oh-ho! The human arrives at last!" shouted papyrus, striking that unbelievably stupid pose with his finger pointed, ahem, 'heroically' at my chest. It'd taken him long enough to notice me, I must have wandered over to them a solid century ago. "In order to stop you, my brother and I have created some puzzles."

I shook my head slightly and quit staring at the ground as if it were about to open up and swallow me whole. There'd be time to reflect on my own stupidity later, for now I had to focus on...oh for the love of God, did he say puzzles? Already?

Papyrus's made that face a deranged psycho killer would wear moments before slaughtering their victim. "I'm sure you'll find this one...quite _shock_ ing!"

Only a pun that insufferably terrible could jolt me back to my normal self. _Wait, was 'jolt' an electricity pun too?...Dammit._

"Leave the puns to your brother, Papyrus. At least his require _half_ a brain to come up with." I nearly smiled. It felt good to be back in business, although that certainly wasn't my strongest of my insults. I must have needed a little more time to get warmed up.

"Aw, you think I have half a brain?" Sans said gratefully. "I could share some with you too, if ya want."

Papyrus seemed just the tiniest bit shy of grateful. "Human, Brother, allow me to finish explaining the puzzle before we engage in the battle of insults," he snapped. Then, regaining his composure, which only made him even harder to take seriously, he added; "For you see, this is my invisible electricity maze!"

I took a look around the area. Well, at least the dunce got the invisible part right. "Alright. Now all we have to do is figure out what the hell an electricity maze is."

"See, I told you the human would be confused!" Papyrus cackled to his brother. He pulled out a small sparkling blue orb from his chest plate and gestured to the empty space surrounding him as if he were presenting his magnum opus to the Louvre. "When you touch the walls of this maze, this orb will administer a hearty zap!" he explained. "Sound like fun?"

I opened my mouth in a pointless effort to fit even a single word in, but Papyrus was far to deep in the zone by this point. His rambles tumbled out of his mouth like children down a flight of stairs, wild and uncontrollable. "Because the amount of fun you will probably have...is actually rather small I think."

"Smartest thing you've said since I got here," I muttered. Now that Papyrus was finished stroking his undeserving ego, and there was actually a moment of near silence, I was able to pick up the slightest _hum_ of rapidly moving electricity coming from the walls of his supposed maze. _He's not bluffing, huh..._

I tried to listen for an opening in the static walls, shifting back and forth without taking a single step forward. I could try going around, but there was no telling how much ground it actually covered, and the space was only so big before it took a nosedive off a cliff. After peering over the edge to the inky blackness below, I decided it wasn't worth risking a leap of faith, unless there were another patch of golden flowers for me to land on at the bottom.

"Oh goody, the human is stumped by The Great Papyrus' _unrivaled_ puzzle crafting skills!" cheered the man himself, relishing in my growing frustration. I'm sure I was wearing my aggravation like an ugly sweater.

"I'm not Goddamn stumped! I just need a sec..." I assured the brothers, having flashbacks to a certain friendly boulder I used to know. Sans stared at me and smiled. The bastard was enjoying this just as much as his brother.

 _What good's a puzzle if there's no indication of how to solve it?_ I thought, but didn't dare speak a word to assholes running the show. All it'd earn me was another round of taunting. After all, the odds of Sans lending a hand in front of his insane human-hunting-fanatic brother were next to none.

 _His insane brother..._

After a solid few minutes of walking around and doing absolutely nothing, the answer slapped me across the face, so obvious in hindsight that I had the sudden urge to hurl myself off the cliff. Papyrus' exact words a minute ago were 'this orb will administer a hearty zap.'

Smiling to myself, I took the position of a track runner about to start their next race, put one hand over the jar holding the snow piece to keep it from slipping out, and sprinted forward without a second thought. As I passed the point of no return, a booming _ZAP_ crackled through the air like a ticked-off bolt of lightning, but it wasn't my body being fried.

Papyrus, still holding on to the orb, was fidgeting like a cartoon character as bolts of electricity arced off his breastplate wildly. However many volts were running through that orb, they were definitely doing some damage.

I slid in beside the brothers, far enough away from the living lightning rod to avoid getting fried, as the orb slowly died out and halted its assault on Papyrus. "How's that for 'shocking?'" I taunted. A flash of guilt swept over me, but it faded as quick as it came. It was his mistake, holding onto the orb like that. Besides, the bag of bones didn't have any flesh to cook, right? Better him than me.

To my surprise, and in all honesty, my relief that I hadn't _completely_ killed him, he appeared pretty much unharmed, especially when you consider how painful his shock had looked. Sure, his teeth were chattering rapidly, his eyes were wide and literally popping out of his skull, and part of his cape-scarf-thing were still on fire like a tacky piece of firewood, but hey...at least he was still standing? Granted, he was barely able to keep on his own two feet due to all the totally-not-at-all-violent body spasms...

"Paps, you okay?" Sans asked, not sounding all too concerned. I guessed Papyrus did stuff like this to himself a lot when he was setting up his traps. Wouldn't surprise me in the least. Hell, I'd be more concerned if he didn't, because that would mean something was terribly wrong with the universe.

'Paps' shook his head furiously as the spasms died down and huffed. "SANS! What did you do this time!?" He screamed at his brother like a toddler throwing a tantrum over a broken toy.

I scowled at the skeleton, the slight sense of pride from overcoming the puzzle fading. Something about the way he berated his brother for a fault of his own got my blood heated up an extra three hundred degrees. "What did _he_ do? Give him a break, _you're_ the idiot holding onto his own trap!"

That finally seemed to get through to Papyrus. He eyed the orb in his hand with something akin to horror, and tensed up in a brief, incredibly satisfying waterfall of embarrassment. I relished in it, but he broke out of it almost instantly to deliver another one of his soon to be famous lines. "Idiot? Please, human, this is all according to my secret plan!" he assured me, taking a bow for good measure, and chucking the orb to who knows where. The conniving weasel added; "I'll lure you into a false sense of security, and then, just when you're guard is lowered...NYEH-HEH-HEH-HEH!"

I smiled. "Thanks for the heads up. I'll be sure to keep my eyes peeled."

Papyrus didn't seem to grasp the fact he'd blatantly revealed his "secret plan" to me, and ran off guffawing, probably to prep his next equally effective trap.

With Papyrus gone, I started to take my leave when I noticed Sans staring at me, even more smug than usual. "What, I have something on my face?" I challenged.

His response was grinning with the intensity of a thousand suns. "Don't think I didn't see that," he goaded.

 _See what?_ I thought, letting out a confused shrug.

"You chewing my brother out," he explained, rolling his eye sockets at my naivety. "Thanks for sticking up for me, but my bro just gets a little over excited. I'm used to it. Besides, he's always had a...thick skull."

Oh. I had defended him? It honestly hadn't even occurred to me I was defending Sans from his dimwitted brother's accusations. Actually...I guess it had crossed my mind as I was spouting the insult, a flash of sympathy for the chubby skeleton, especially obvious to me now that he'd pointed it out. Apparently, a short fuse had its advantages.

A content expression fell over Sans' face, but there was a hint of something else in his eyes. Solemness?

In a fainter tone, staring down at the sparkling surface of the snow, he said dreamily; "I haven't seen him this happy in a long time."

I was at a total loss for words, and this time, it wasn't from the awful "thick skull" pun. "Uh...you're welcome?" I half-asked, not completely convinced I earned the credit. I'd take it no problem, but I can't say I've done much to help beside walking forward and torturing myself with puzzles and puns.

...Scratch that, _totally_ deserved the praise.

"Ya know," Sans continued, seeming to address the ground rather than me. Fair enough, it was probably the better listener. "We made that knight outfit he's wearing a couple weeks ago for costume party, and he hasn't taken it off since." He chuckled to himself, shaking his head. "Keeps calling it his 'battle body.' Man, my brother is the coolest..."

 _Since when is playing dress-up in a half-assed King Arthur costume twenty-four/seven 'cool?'_ I nearly asked Sans that myself, but realized I didn't exactly feel inclined to listen to Sans try to glorify his brother. So I bit my tongue at the last moment and stood there silently, waiting for Sans to say or do anything else.

After awhile, Sans snapped out of his blissful state looking embarrassed. "I'll go on ahead," he said quickly, shaking himself back to his usual attitude. "The next puzzle's all mine." I rolled my eyes as he winked at me for the millionth time and followed in Papyrus' crisp ankle-deep footprints, leaving me alone again.

"If it's anything like your brother's, I think I'll come out in one piece!" I yelled after him as I watched the speck of blue that was his hoodie disappear over a snowy hill.

Once the skele-bros were gone, I had hoped that I could relax and forget about them for a moment, applying the "out of sight, out of mind," mentality. But, no matter how much I wanted to keep my thoughts as far away from those two as possible, I couldn't help but stand frozen where they'd left me, dragging my mind by the ankles until I was back to thinking about Sans, amazed at how he came to care about his brother so much. Not because Sans acted overly caring or sympathetic towards the criminally insane Papyrus, but because he did so despite every exchange I'd seen between them feeling hostile, and borderline formulaic; Papyrus insults Sans, Sans retorts with some kind of joke or pun, Papyrus gets angry and yells some more, rinse, repeat, and add me into the loop tearing my own hair out once in awhile, all rolled together in what could easily pass as a great idea for a terrible sitcom. "Dumb and Dumber meets Alice in Wonderland." It didn't seem like Paps gave his brother a semblance of a molecule of a reason to give him the time of day, let alone drift off into a dreamy monologue about how "cool" Papyrus was.

You know what? I don't think I'd even heard the lanky skeleton spout anything to Sans that wasn't either self-serving or some kind of insult or accusation. Sometimes it was warranted, and other times they came flying in completely out of the blue. I suppose Sans didn't seem to be bothered living under constant trial with a mad judge, and he didn't exactly let the jury walk all over him, coming up to the stand armed to the teeth with deadly puns. Regardless, that didn't make me want to strangle Papyrus with his own scarf...cape...thing any less, nor did it help me to even remotely understand Sans' affection.

So then, what the hell was it? What did Sans see in his walking train wreck of a brother that was vaguely redeemable? Maybe he had an awesome hidden talent I wasn't aware of, like...window washing, or...maybe he his whole persona was an act, and he didn't actually have the personality of silly string, or...maybe he baked a mean batch of brownies?

...Welp, I didn't care enough to manufacture any other possibilities, so lets hope I was right about the brownies for now.

Unfortunately, the thought of brownies sent a disturbingly long and low grumble through my stomach, which soon crescendoed until it was just the tiniest bit louder than a series of nuclear explosions on the site of the world's largest brass section. I placed a comforting hand on my stomach as if it actually were about to explode, confirmed that it was holding it together, and started sprinting forward again in a panic anyway.

Damn, I hadn't felt this empty in a long, long time. When was the last meal I'd eaten? The pie I ate at Toriel's table seemed like the last thing I could remember scarfing down, and that was well over a few hours ago. Just that morning, actually...weird. Such a short time, and I was already hungry enough that my stomach was screaming as it imploded on itself, like a star at the end of its life.

Okay, sure, maybe I was exaggerating a tad, but even counting the pie, I hadn't exactly been stuffing myself like royalty recently. I woke up half-dead in an unfamiliar, and as I would soon discover, bat-shit insane place, with no food. After getting knocked out _again,_ I stomached a few awful candies, a cookie baked out of spiders ("just like mother used to make" my ass,) passed out again for a few hours, and finally devoured Tori's mouthwatering pie. After trudging through the...albeit not very harsh, snowy landscape another couple hours, I certainly felt like I could and would gorge myself on literally any bit of food right about now.

Scratch that, anything _besides_ the revolting spider cider residing uselessly in my back pocket, if that even counted as food. Maybe a nice, warm, bubbling bowl of delicious and nutritious sulfuric acid instead.

Trying my best to ignore the mind numbing hunger, I followed the brothers' trail of footprints. Tailing the two wasn't exactly the hardest task, you'd have to have the vision of a wild Helen Keller to miss the tracks Papyrus' heavy metal boots left, and as I turned a particularly barren corner, my luck finally decided to turn around for the better.

Sitting precariously close to the drop-off was a small food cart, wearing an annoyingly vivid red and yellow striped umbrella sticking out of the top. The damn thing couldn't have looked more out of place on Mars than it could out here, wheels half buried in the snow, in the middle of nowhere.

The guy (at least, I _thought_ it was a guy)...the anthro-rabbit running the cart seemed to think that as well. He leaned against it lazily, somehow managing to look bored out of his mind and distraught at the same time, in stark contrast to his lurid outfit that seemed to be screaming, "Please buy something! It's delicious! It's fabulous! If you rub it on your skin, it'll make you live forever!" Must've been standing there for awhile too, if the massive amount of pure white snow laced with his bizarre turquoise fur was any indication.

I slowed down as I approached the vendor, greeting him with; "Dude, your cat get run over by a snowmobile or something? It's bad for buisness to look so down in the dumps. Unless Papyrus stopped by, 'cause then I'd totally get the feeling."

The stranger took time away from feeling sorry for himself to look up at me as I neared him, sighing. "I wish," he whined. "At least then I would've had _one_ customer...ugh, I just don't get why these aren't selling!"

I smirked at him. "I mean, opening up shop in the middle of nowhere probably wasn't your best idea."

"But it's the _perfect_ weather for something cold!" he argued, rearing his leg back. Before I could warn him against it...eh, sure, we'll go with that... before I could warn him against it, he delivered a heavy kick to the side of his supposed beloved cart. The sharp sound of flesh and bone colliding against metal rang out along with a cry of pain from the rabbit, leaving him grasping his foot in pain and muttering some rather harsh words under his breath.

Meanwhile, I was attempting and failing to contain my laughter. "S-something cold?" I chuckled, pulling an arm over my mouth and faking it as a cough. "You mean, food, right? 'Cause I've been out here in the cold starving half to death, so I'm up for just about anything right now." _Except the spider slop,_ I reminded myself. _Please don't try and sell me frozen spiders on a stick._

"Yeah, I'll bet...wait." Just as the last word left his mouth, his dreary mood completely vanished, and his long ears shot up in excitement. "Are you a customer?!" he blurted.

I flinched at his sporadic outburst (mostly at the wads of spit he sent flying at my face), wondering if he'd caught on to the fact that I was human, or was so desperate for some business he was willing to cast aside any morality he had left. I certainly wasn't complaining, since fighting for my food didn't sound very appealing at the moment. "I mean, depends on what you call a 'customer,'" I began, waving off his excitement...and saliva, like an irritating fly. "If you consider a customer to be some asshole who's remotely interested in whatever the hell you're selling, then you might just have one on your hands, furball."

Literally faster than I could blink, the rabbit ducked behind his cart, slid open the top, grabbed something out of it, and offered it out to me wearing a grin huge enough to rival Sans'. "Hello!" he bellowed, talking so fast I could barely make out the words. "You seem a little down in the dumps. Would you like some Nice Cream? It's the frozen treat that warms your heart!"

Huh. That was actually...a pretty good tagline. I eyed the frozen treat in his hand, mere inches from my face, resisting the urge to snatch it right out of his grasp. Aside from the extra N, it looked just like a normal, bland...delicious...tantalizing ice cream cone, matching the color of the nice cream guy's fur. _Maybe it's blue raspberry..._

"Now just fifteen gold!"

Huh. That was officially...the worst follow up to a pretty good tagline in the history of everything.

"Fifteen gold?!" I spat as he shattered my thoughts of icy goodness. "What, you're trying to feed...every sorry mouth...in the Underground..." I trailed off, making sure he wouldn't hear the last part. At first, I was furious he was trying to con me out of my money. Then two things occurred to me; One, I bought both the spider cider and the cookie for about that same amount without any question. And two, how much is _any_ of this shit worth down here? For all I knew, gold was as common as snot, or the 'gold' pieces were made out of fools' gold or something.

On the other hand, maybe he _was_ a con artist making up numbers off the top of his head in hopes of making a quick, scummy buck off the guy he'd never seen before. Just to be sure, I started out pulling out the gold pieces I'd collected from the Ruins to count them, although I didn't remember getting too many off the residents...

"See, you have the perfect amount right there!" said the nice cream guy, pointing to me with his free hand. "Fifteen gold exactly!"

...What has my life become? A TV show for distracting three-year-olds?

I stopped, glancing at the coins in my hand. _Only three,_ I thought. _Maybe each coin is worth five gold?_ If that were the case, and if the heaviness of my pockets were any indication, I had tons more cash than I thought. So I slipped the vendor the coins and took the nice cream out of his hand.

"Hope you enjoy it!" he said cheerily. "Have a super-duper day!"

"Yeah...little bit late for that," I muttered absentmindedly, taking an eager bite of the frozen treat.

Well...it was certainly cold. Sweet too, with a certain sharp bite to it I'd expect from something like a cider. (Ugh. I shudder just hearing the word. Damn you, spider bake sale!) I'd been right in assuming it was blue raspberry, and it wasn't bad for an ice cream cone. Only two problems; it was already freezing out, which made the cone a bit hard to stomach without turning into a human ice cube. The other problem...it just didn't come close to comparing to Tori's butterscotch-cinnamon pie.

Keeping the trend the other food had set, I felt the small wound Snowdrake had left for me on the back of my head begin to close, until it felt good as new.

"So, how is it?!"

I looked at the Nice Cream Guy in between bites. If the healing powers of the food weren't applying, I'd have felt exhausted just talking to this guy. "It's pretty good," I confirmed, putting his eagerness to rest. "Maybe if you moved shop, you'd actually sell a couple of these. Even if you _do_ get a customer, most people won't stomach cold food in cold weather."

"You really think so?" He stopped to consider it for a second. "Thanks! I think I might know just the spot..."

I left him packing up his shop to move to his new location, taking my sweet time on the nice cream since I already knew it wouldn't melt. With my free hand, I counted the rest of my hard-earned cash, totaling at about fourteen pieces. So that would be...seventy gold. Although, some of the coins were different sizes. I'd have to remember to ask Sans about the value of them later.

"Human!" came an all-too-familiar voice. I took the time of day away from my nice cream, spotting the skeleton brothers standing around waiting for me to approach. Again. How many times would I have to keep up this charade? "I hope you're ready for..."

"Hold the damn phone!" I yelled to my new biggest and boniest fan, shoving the coins back in my pocket. Why was everyone down here so frigging eager to shove their noses in my business? I stared down the skeleton brothers with a fire in my eyes, not quite ready for round two of puzzles. "Lemme finish this...nice cream...first?"

 _Damn, it's already gone?_ I tossed the last piece of the cone in my mouth, imagining Papyrus' bones getting crushed with each crunch of the cone. "Never mind, let's get this over with."

"Ah, I thought you'd never ask!" The Mediocre Papyrus chattered.

"I didn't ask a question-"

"-Wait, Sans, WHERE'S THE PUZZLE!?" Papyrus looked totally bewildered, scanning the area for any sign of a puzzle.

I did the same myself, and all of a sudden "where's the puzzle" seemed awfully fitting for this situation. Unless it was another invisible maze or there was something hidden in the trees, there didn't seem to be anything relatively threatening nearby. Either Sans was doing me a favor, or he was actually too lazy to be bothered in throwing together a trap.

"It's right there," Sans said casually. "On the ground."

Oh, that slip of paper half-buried in the snow was my puzzle for the hour. I'd noticed it before, but had figured someone had just missed the trash can and been too "busy" to pick it up. "You're serious?" I asked, not totally convinced.

"Trust me," Sans assured his massive audience of two people. "There's no way they can get past this one." And then he winked at me. Again.

"You should really get that weird twitch in your eye checked out, Sansy," I jabbed, bending over to snatch the stray slip of paper.

The words "Monster Kidz Word Search" screamed up at me in lurid neon lettering. I stared at the text for a moment, dumbfounded. Sans' puzzle was literally just a word search, no strings attached, no hoops to jump over, just a piece of paper where you scan a maze of letters to pick out and circle words like "skeletons" or "mermaid" or "giasfclfebrehber." The numbskull didn't even leave me a pencil to attempt to solve the puzzle with even if I wanted too, for whatever reason.

Which I didn't, because these word searches were literally invented by Satan himself. No, I'm totally serious. Look it up.

So, in response to the insulting, degrading, lazy excuse for a puzzle resting in my hands, I stared down the skeleton brothers with an apathetic expression on my face, and slowly ripped the paper in half from top to bottom, reveling in the tear of each individual fiber, casting the two pieces aside when I was finished for added effect.

"SANS! That didn't do anything!"

"Whoops." Sans shrugged off his failure. "I knew I should've used today's crossword instead."

I scoffed at that. "Right, because if I ran into a _crossword_ lying on the ground in the middle of a snowy wasteland, I would've taken my sweet time solving it."

"WHAT!? CROSSWORD!?" Papyrus shouted, baffled at the thought. For once, I thought he was actually going to say something reasonable, and tell Sans that no mere piece of paper could stop me.

Of course, there wasn't enough good left in the Universe to allow that to happen.

"I can't believe you ACTUALLY just said the crossword is harder than Junior Jumble!"

"What? Really, dude?" Sans argued. "That easy-peasy word scramble's for baby bones."

"Un. Believable. HUMAN!" He turned to me as if I should have all the answers, his figure pointed in the air. "SOLVE THIS DISPUTE!"

 _Guess the spotlight's on me now?_ In hindsight, the crossword would probably be harder, but I figured if I picked one at random it would get them off my back quicker, so I went with the first one that popped into my head. "I don't know, Junior Jumble, I guess."

"Ha! Yes!" cheered Papyrus. "Humans must be very intelligent if they also find Junior Jumble so difficult!" Just like the last time I'd finished one of their puzzles, Papyrus spun around and ran off laughing to himself, even though he accomplished jack-shit.

Sans eyed his brother as he ran off. "Aaaand there he goes." Then he nodded in my direction. "Thanks for saying 'Junior Jumble' just to appease my brother. Yesterday he got stumped trying to 'solve' the horoscope."

I chuckled as Papyrus vanished and said, "Why does that not surprise me at all?"


	13. Chapter 13: My One Weakness!

_Human! Please enjoy this spaghetti. (Little do you know, this spaghetti is a trap designed to entice you! You'll be so busy eating it, you won't realize that you aren't progressing! Thoroughly japed again by The Great Papyrus!)_

"Signed; Nyeh-heh-heh, Papyrus," I finished reading out loud, crumpling up and tossing the letter over my shoulder with a sigh. Thank _God_ he warned me, or who _knows_ how long I would've been stuck here trying to make a dent in the inedible plate of spaghetti frozen to the damn table. Why, I don't know what I would've done if I stopped here to heat up the pasty pasta in the BROKEN-ASS microwave, which, by the way, ONLY had settings reading "SPAGHETTI," sitting on the OLD, SPLINTERY table that he LEFT IN THE MIDDLE OF A SNOWY WASTELAND.

And why spaghetti? Now, a fine platter of filet mignon grilled to absolute juicy perfection with a side of white rice, that's a dish a _sensible_ person would've left.

I forced myself to keep moving when I realized the longer I stayed, the more effective his "trap" technically was, and finished up counting the rest of my gold. After I triumphed over the incredibly challenging Junior Jumble Word Search, I managed to wrench Sans away from his puns long enough for him to explain to me how the currency worked in the Underground. He had no idea whether it was real gold or not (I figured as much,) but he did remember that the value of the coins scaled as they grew in size, in values of one, two, five, ten, and twenty. After buying the nice cream, I had about...sixty-five left over. So, if I had enough money for like, four ice cream cones, I was virtually set for life. After that, Sans did that thing he loves to do and walk away in the wrong direction, promising to meet me up ahead.

Turning a sharp corner, I treaded past a small sign reading; "Warning: Dog Marriage."

...A small sign reading; yeah, it really did say that. I honestly had to read it at least twice before I was sure my brain had processed that correctly. The actual living hell did that mean? Of all the warnings I'd received so far, this seemed somehow both the most ridiculous and the most worthless, and that was counting Papyrus' spaghetti warning from a few seconds ago. That is, unless the sign was a joke put by the couple themselves because the marriage is terrible, which in that case, it's hilarious. Because domestic disputes are...hilarious.

Basically I'm saying the sign was stupid.

"Arf! Arf!"

I instinctively reached for the Almighty Stick when I heard the barks, fearing Doggo had left his post to settle the score between us. Fortunately, as I tore my eyes of the "warning" and spun around to face the noise, I wasn't met with a furious Doggo. I should've known it wasn't him the second the sound entered my ears, because he'd at least been intelligent enough to know how to talk, a pretty neat trick for a dog.

I'd say this dog looked like he could speak about as fluently as a rock, but considering my experience in the Ruins, that statement was being _way_ too generous.

The mutt returned a stare blanker than a piece of paper fresh off the press, pretty much the exact opposite of Doggo's steely glare. In fact, "the exact opposite of Doggo" described this new dog perfectly, aside from the fact they both stood on their hind legs and were built vaguely like humans. His tongue flopped out of his mouth like a fish on a dry deck, he was panting heavily even though it was negative three thousand degrees out, and he wore a dull suit of armor with stains the color of mud on every conceivable speck of it. It almost made the massive sword and shield he held seem not threatening at all.

Of course, a sharp and pointy stick wielded by something with that clueless expression was even more threatening than someone who at least looked like they knew how to use it.

"Easy boy..." I said calmly, taking a few cautious steps backwards.

In response, the dog banged his oversized kitchen utensils together and let loose a loud, "BARK!" Then he started to advance on me.

 _Welp, diplomacy has failed, then. Dumb mutt will regret it in a second._ I grabbed the Almighty Stick and pointed it at his chest, challenging him to draw closer. His pointy stick against mine, even though one of ours (if you could guess who's) was a little bit overpowered.

I guess we'll never know for sure, because the very instant I held the stick out to him, the dog froze in place and his eyes locked onto it like a slightly-below-average-intelligence wolf to its prey. It only took me a moment to notice, and only a split second after that to start taking advantage of it. I moved my arm in different directions, smirking as his whole body moved to keep up with it. Eventually he dropped his gear to the ground and got on all fours, panting in double-time. I had seriously caught a break this time.

"The one thing no dog is strong or smart enough to resist...a game of fetch," I chuckled to myself. Taking a small step back to line up the shot, I tossed the stick a fair distance over the dog's head. He barked excitedly and bounded after it without a second thought, assuming his brain was actually capable of the first thought.

As I watched every-other-man's-best-friend-but-mine chug through the snow after the stick, I debated turning back to the path and making my way forward. But something stopped me, besides the fact I'd have to leave the Almighty Stick behind, which was already reason enough to sit my ass down and wait. My gaze fell on the dog's discarded shield lying face-up, and more importantly, the design sculpted onto it. A diamond in the center, two wing-like shapes on either side of it, and underneath that were a set of three triangles forming a...

...a what?...

I narrowed my eyes. "That symbol...where the hell have I seen that before?"

...A s _miley face!_

I remembered it now. It was the exact same design that I'd seen on one of the last pairs of doors I'd past through on my way out of the Ruins. The same one that Toriel had guarded with her life when we fought.

Great, now that was one mystery was solved, but what the hell did it actually mean? Or maybe it didn't mean anything, and it was just a fancy symbol to...you know...look nice?

"Woah!" Before I could give it another thought, the dog charged head-first into my legs with the force of a pissed-off rhino, holding the stick between his jaws. It was enough to knock me off balance and nearly sent me tumbling into the snow. "Hey, get off! Stop! Get your head out of my crotch!" I grabbed him just below the ears and tried to wrestle him off me, but there was no end to his unrelentingly friendly assault. He was persistently obnoxious, built like a brick, and bigger than my whole body, not to mention wearing a suit of metal armor. Couple that with his level of intelligence and it was basically the equivalent of fighting off an _actual_ rhino, and one more clingy than a crazed paparazzi. "God dammit, how do people actually tame these things?! Down, boy, DOWN!"

Apparently, you tame them by screaming at the top of your lungs, because the moment that horrendous sound crawled out of my mouth the dog backed off, whimpering like a...uh...well, a sad dog. I was glad to have him off of me, as well as a brief moment to reevaluate what my shit-hole of a life has become. Problem was, that little skirmish was only about half the battle.

"Awesome, great, fantastic, now drop the damn stick!" I commanded. Go figure, he complied almost immediately, and dropped my beloved partner directly into my waiting arms.

In my dreams.

In reality, the mutt stood his ground firmly, and from this moment on, I can say with utmost certainty that I finally understood where the term "puppy dog eyes" came from. The look he gave me was warm and full enough to melt the cold, icy, black hole of a heart that resides within the rib cage of politicians everywhere like an ice cube. Thankfully, I was not, in fact, a politician.

"Beat it, dude. I have better things to do than freeze my ass off playing _fetch_." I grabbed the stick and yanked as hard as physically possible, but the damn mutt's chompers were clamped tight around it like a frigging bear trap. It let out a low, rumbling growl as we played tug-of-war for a good thirty seconds. My hands were burning so hot I'm surprised the thing didn't catch on fire. "Alright, alright, you win!" I wailed, ready to throw in the towel. "I give up! I'll throw the stick again, just LET GO!"

Of _course_ the furball understood that much, finally agreeing to back off long enough for me to throw the stick, only for him to chase after it and for the cycle to begin all over again. I dreaded how much time I'd have to waste here mindlessly throwing the stick until my knight in shining armor finally got bored and left me alone.

 _Throw, wait, take, repeat._ We went on long enough to fall into a sort of rhythm, working like pendulums in a clock. I _guess_ I could see how people enjoyed doing this with their pets. It was almost relaxing, if not mind-numbingly boring and completely pointless.

If the wagging tail was any indication, my partner in crime seem to be enjoying it just fine. Hell, he seemed like he was having the time of his life. Although the Almighty Stick would probably be wailing in agony from all the puncture wounds by now.

Just as I thought I'd be stuck there for all eternity, the dog chased after the stick one last time before dropping it by my feet, finally content. I found myself reaching out to pet him absentmindedly, as if our game of fetch actually _had_ lured me into some kind of trance. Its fur was surprisingly soft, not nearly as gruff and patchy as I expected it to be. The dog unsurprisingly welcomed my affection with open arms, rubbing it's head along my hand and getting excited all over again.

 _Why are you still wasting your time with him?_

"Uh...whatever, good dog, I guess," I muttered, snapping myself back to reality despite even more whimpers of protest. I hastily backed away from the dog and wiped any lingering dog slobber off the Almighty Stick in the snow. The entire time I did so, he was giving me those puppy dog eyes again. I did my best to ignore them.

Vaguely content with the cleanliness of the stick, I stood up and turned to walk away, much to pooch's dismay. But when I turned to put his whimpers and pleas to a stop, I found he had already trotted off. The only reminder it'd ever been there were its footprints and the imprints its sword and shield had left in the snow. I admit I stared at the empty void of space it had left for another moment or two before hurrying on, although I couldn't come up with even a half-assed reason why.

Thankfully, I didn't have to waste too much time forging one, because progress was quickly halted by my age old enemy...

"...Spikes. Why is it always frigging spikes?" A row of them spread out before me, blocking the path forward. Couldn't quite jump them (not without gutting myself, anyways), couldn't get around them, and there was no sign of any lever or switch to press. "Seriously, there's other methods of containing people besides spikes!" I complained, kicking the ground in frustration. "How about a nice brick wall, or a fence, or...an enraged clown posse, or...something?"

I cut my own self-pity session short when my gaze caught something on the ground. When I'd kicked it earlier, a few patches of snow had gone flying and tumbling over one another, leaving the ground relatively uncovered. But something didn't seem quite normal. There were...markings in the dirt.

Leaning down, I dragged my hand along the remaining clumps of snow, wincing at the biting cold. Once I felt like I'd uncovered enough of the image, I stood up and took a closer look at it. Lines were drawn about in the dirt, leading to a big red X.

"More markings. Maybe a map?" I wondered aloud, because once in my head just wasn't enough. At closer inspection, it looked like a simple sketch of the immediate area. If I was lucky, that X on the map would be where I disable the spikes, or a hidden path. I mean, I didn't have any other basis to go off of. Even in the worst case scenario I was going digging for buried treasure.

...Did I say worst case? I meant _best_ case, a very, very good case.

I followed the map for a brief jog in the direction I'd come from, past a couple snow covered boulders, around a bushy evergreen tree...there! That patch of ground with almost no snow covering it, that was right where the X had been. I stomped on the space, and ground moved down with the force of my foot. A few muffled clicks and whirs rose from underneath my feet, and the spikes sank back down into the ground where they belonged.

Still would've preferred buried treasure, but I suppose that worked as well.

I made my way back over to the now retracted spikes, making extra careful to spit on each and every one of them as I passed. How many more traps and puzzles would I have to deal with until I was out of this hell-hole? Seriously, most of them could've been designed by six-year-olds (I'm looking at you Junior Jumble), so they acted more as nuisances than obstacles. Don't even get me _started_ on the guy behind them, Papyrus. That idiotic bag of bones...

Lets just say he wouldn't fancy bumping into me in an alleyway. Or a crowded street in broad daylight. Or anywhere on the planet.

I crossed a couple of planks of wood posing as a bridge, creaking from my weight alone. At least if they gave away and I fell through the good thirty feet of open air below me, I had a pile of soft, cushiony, prickly and incredibly uncomfortable pine trees to break my fall, and maybe my back too while they were at it. Thankfully, the rickety old boards held my weight long enough for me to cross no problem. Right into oncoming danger.

The instant my feet settled back onto solid ground, I spotted a flash of movement out of the corner of my eye. Since it was my luck we were talking about, the motion was coming from the only direction I could possibly go in. Gritting my teeth, I turned towards the potential danger...

...And had a god damn heart attack when an axe came swinging down in front of my face.

"HOLY SHIT!" I stumbled backwards just in time to avoid getting my head chopped in half like a watermelon, and just enough to end up lying on my back with my head hanging over the cliff, only inches away from slipping off the icy edge. "Gee, and I was _just_ starting to get bored. Thank god _everyone_ wants me dead around here!" I yelled, pocketing my panic enough to climb back to my feet, and grab each of my weapons, which thankfully didn't go toppling over the edge.

Finally stable, I tried to sum up the situation at a glance. There were two almost identical hooded attackers draped in jet black robes you'd expect to see in some kind of cult, each holding literal battleaxes in their...paws. Snouts poked out from underneath their shadowy gaze, further proof they were canine. One was blocking the my way forward, weapon at the ready, and the other, who had shamelessly tried to decapitate me a moment ago, was already moving in front of the bridge. My only method of escaping.

I was trapped.

"So, _you_ are the source of that weird smell," the one who attacked me hissed, baring his teeth at me in a sinister snarl.

The other nodded in agreement, saying in a woman's voice, "Identify yoursmelf!"

 _Does literally everyone make terrible puns around here?_ "I don't know about this, guys," I began, dodging the question entirely. I figured talking my way out was the best solution. I'd try fighting, but my weapons were virtually a pair of chopsticks compared to their torture devices, and...well...those axes were _really_ scary. "Three is kind of a crowd, don'tcha think? How 'bout you come at me one at a time instead, it'll be more fun that way."

At first, the pair shared no reaction. For a second I actually thought my dumbass idea got through to them.

"I think my wife and I would rather just cut to the chase..." the closer attacker barked, peeling back their hood. Sure enough, it was another pooch, and at first glance looked far more threatening than the last. "...and eliminate."

As if on cue, the other dog threw back their hood, this one appearing both identical (which seriously got me thinking there was a case of incest going on in this relationship, by the way,) and yet far more...feminine, I guess? "Eliminate YOU!" She bellowed.

 _Warning: dog marriage._ So that's what it meant. I was going to be pulverized into some stupid doggy couple's chew toy. Fan-freaking-tastic.

The two started to shift closer to me, careful not to give any openings for me to dart around them. The cut of land we were on was so small that just trying to get past them would end with me tumbling over the cliff.

Little did they know, I wouldn't go down without a fight. And I already knew their weakness. It worked on the mutt, it worked on Doggo...kinda, and I was confident it would work here too. It better, anyways, or else I could look forward to one of those battleaxes getting shoved up my ass. Which, if my calculations were correct, would really blow.

Putting on my widest grin and using my patented salesman voice, I held up the Almighty Stick and said, "Are you sure you two wouldn't rather play a nice, friendly, non-violent game of _fetch_?"

Now _that_ instantly grabbed their full attention. Even though they were both still a few yards away, I could tell their eyes were widening in excitement. "Mmm, I-I think we'd better not," the male dog stuttered, twitching nervously.

The wife didn't even bother to hide her enthusiasm towards the idea. "Oh, come on puppy, every dog loves to play fetch!" she insisted, cupping her arm around her husband's and dropping the axe.

 _Checkmate_ , I thought. If there's anything I learned from books and movies, when the wife wanted something done in a semi-stable relationship, it happened. Period.

"I-I don't know puppy...what will the rest of the royal guard say?"

 _Royal guard? Interesting._ Even though he was still coming up with excuses, the sweat dripping down his forehead was proof enough he couldn't resist the temptation much longer. Like moths to a flame or humans to any and all controversy, these guys were drawn and overwhelmed by the power of the stick.

"Going once..." I teased, holding the stick out over the ledge by the tip. I let it drop just a little bit farther between my fingers. "Going twice..." _Please don't make me drop it. Please don't make me drop it._

"Alright already, you win!" cried the male dog.

"Just throw the stick!" cried the female dog.

"If you insist." I aimed my throw up over their heads, careful not to send the stick hurtling off the cliff, and threw it as hard as I could. Although I wasn't exactly ecstatic about wasting my time playing another game of fetch, it was worth not dying horribly at the hands of a disgustingly affectionate couple (seriously, even when fighting over the stick they still slipped in a stomach-churning smooch now and again). Besides, watching the married couple butt heads over who got to run the stick back to me made it more than worth the effort. Yes, even with the lovey-dovey crap mixed in.

My eyes treaded over the discarded axes more than once for long periods of time, but every time, I opted out of grabbing them. Even if I had wanted to turn on the dogs, I was pretty sure I wasn't strong enough to wield those gigantic blades without chopping my own foot off. Besides, how I was I supposed to avoid murdering any poor sap with weapons that deadly? In fact, I'd come to figure forgetting Doggo's swords from earlier was a lucky break for me, if I was going to prove to Flowey I could play by my own rules. I couldn't wait to rub my Almighty Stick in that little shit's face when I got out of here with a clean record.

We repeated the process until my arm started feeling like lead, and I told them I had to stop. I worried that the moment we stopped they'd go back to their attempted murder, but they seemed much cheerier than before. My heart skipped a beat when they bent over to retrieve their battleaxes, although our little game of fetch seemed to completely wipe their sole objective to kill me from their minds, because they didn't make any aggresive moves.

"I guess weird smells can bring good things..." said Dogamy, who had mentioned his and his wife's name during our game.

"Like friendly fun fetch!" finished Dogaressa, nuzzling her husband's snout.

 _Oh, barf._ "Glad I could help show you two a good time," I said out of the corner of my mouth, using the snow to wipe dog slobber off the stick for about the...what was it, dozenth time now? "While you're at it, could you guys put in a good word for me with the other monsters up ahead so they don't...kill me, wait, GUYS!?"

I glanced up to find the two were already _way_ too far away to hear me, and moving fast in the opposite direction. Those bastards were so enamored with each other they had totally forgotten about me, and started to leave while I was distracted!

But hey, it was _totally_ fine after all, because they remembered to throw me a couple warm goodbyes over they're football-sized shoulders, even though they practically had to scream them for me to hear. "Thanks, weird smell!" called Dogamy.

"It sure was fun to 'stick' around!" finished Dogaressa.

 _Seriously, don't make me barf,_ I said internally, although on the outside I yelled, "Yeah, see ya." _Assholes!_

I gave the couple a few minutes to wobble on ahead before following alone. Who knew, maybe they'd remember on their own to stop and tell all the monsters along the way to ignore the human wandering around like a little kid lost in a clothing store.

 _Yeah, and maybe they'll roll out the red carpet for me with a huge cake waiting at the other end. And I've probably seen the last of The Mediocre Papyrus' traps, too. That'll be the dog-damn day._


	14. Chapter 14: The Ultimate Puzzle

_Turn every X into an O, then press the switch,"_ I read to myself. Gee, thanks random sign! Never would've figured that one out without your gracious sharing of unparalleled expertise!

It was another one of Papyrus' puzzles designed for those not yet capable of coherent thoughts. Which was probably about eighty percent of the Underground's population. Who knows, maybe Papyrus was actually considered the crowned king of puzzle designers down here. Then again, by his words alone he still didn't have any friends, so...I guess he just sucked.

A couple of rows of boulders were aligned to form two short pathways leading to a pair of separated X-shaped pressure plates. _Step on the first X, turn it into an O, double back and press the other X, hit the switch beside them, boom. Done. Spikes back in the ground._ And that only took about...thirteen seconds. Riveting puzzle, Paps.

And who else to run into _immediately_ after solving it but the marvelous puzzle wizard himself? A shame, really. I was just starting to enjoy not having him around.

"WHAT!?" Papyrus squawked, like an ugly old crow with a piece of moldy bread shoved down its throat. "How did you avoid my trap!?"

"I-"

"-And MORE importantly..."

I let my hands drop defeatedly. Hey, at least he let me get in a single syllable before he cut me off again. I bet there wasn't a single thing in this world he enjoys more than the sound of his own voice.

"...Is there any left for me?"

My jaw nearly dropped. Was he talking about the damn plate of appalling, indigestible spaghetti with sauce the color of human feces he had set out for me? The trap so lazily slapped together he literally had to leave a note _telling_ me it was a setup? The abomination and insult to cooking in general? And he was asking me if I saved him some.

Wow. Just...just wow. I had nothing to say, nothing to do but put on a sappy smile and sing, "Of course, I saved _plenty_ of it for you, buddy!"

In the same amount of time it took me to remember Papyrus shared his level of understanding of sarcasm with toddlers, his expression changed to...a much softer one. "Really!?" he gasped, sounding genuinely surprised. "Wowie..."

I opened my mouth to say something, but, ironically, I stopped when he didn't make any move to interrupt me. For the first time since I'd met him, Paps seemed at a genuine loss for words.

"You resisted the flavor of my home cooked pasta..." he continued, barely above a whisper. "Just so you could share it with me?"

Now _I_ was the one at a loss for words. Did...did the Mediocre Papyrus just express an emotion besides an absurd amount of (completely unwarranted) pride? Was the world coming to an end? Would the streets be flooded with protests and riots and blood for years to come? Or worse...would we see cats and dogs living together?

Or was I _seriously_ overreacting to an honestly not-so-surprising revelation? Probably that last one, yeah.

I clicked my tongue, searching for the right insult to put him back in his place. Eventually, though, I...I decided against it. I mean, no point driving someone down further when they already lived at the center of the god damn Earth, right? And why not let him think I did something nice for a change, it might help me out in the long run. So I opted to let him off the hook for once, with one that he wouldn't quite get.

"Whatever helps you sleep at night, Paps."

"AND you care deeply about my sleeping habits!?" he said, a response so ridiculous yet so similar to what I predicted I was forced to crack a smile. He paused for another moment, lost in thought. After the longest five seconds of my life, he snapped back to his good 'ole, annoying, happy-go-lucky self. "Fret not, human! I, master chef Papyrus, will make you all the pasta you could ever want!" Then he sprinted off again, that same awful laugh trailing behind him like the putrid stench of a skunk. "HEH HEH HEH HEH HEH HEH NYEH!"

Huh. I hadn't realized the quote-on-quote "master chef" had a single gracious bone in his body, but apparently, I was wrong. He almost made me wanna go back and leave him some pasta _for real_. Maybe that's the side of him Sans had come to tolerate over the years, although I still had to give the lazy-bones credit. If I were living with that clown, I would've cracked faster than an eggshell in an explosion the size of Texas.

I found the scarf-cape-thing-toting skeleton again not even a few meters forward, meandering out in the open like a hopelessly confused tourist in Vegas. As I passed by him, instead of another high school yearbook-worthy quote being tossed my way as I expected, he avoided my gaze entirely and attempted to whistle, which looked a lot frigging harder without any lips.

"Something you wanted to tell me, Edward Scissor Lips?" I asked, folding my arms in front of my chest. Was he sweating? _Damn, I'm so cool even skeletons sweat buckets when I'm around._ "And how the hell are you doing that? You don't have any pores."

Papyrus...oddly enough, tensed up at the sound of my voice, and proceeded to ignore me entirely. What the hell had changed? First I couldn't get him to leave me alone, and now he wouldn't even give me the time of day, with his lips locked tighter than the stick up his ass. I gave him a few more seconds to offer me his _generous_ presence, then finally sighed in defeat and kept moving.

"SO, my brother started a sock collection recently!" Paps blurted.

Well, that certainly came outta left field. That's what all the secrecy was about? A crappy attempt at small talk? "No way! Next you'll be telling me he collects _quarters_ , too,"" I said, rolling my eyes.

Papyrus frowned. "A quarter of what?" Then he shook his head, not bothering to wait for an answer. "But isn't that...saddening?"

"Saddening? Why would that be 'saddening?' You got something against socks?"

Papyrus sighed. It was weird, almost uncomfortable for me seeing him this serious, like striking up a friendly conversation with a clown in his off duty hours.

"Lemme guess; it was a terrible sock puppet show when you were a kid. I get it man, those things can be real scary," I mocked him, trying to lighten the mood.

"The Great Papyrus is not frightened by some crude children's toy!" he assured me. Looking unsure of himself all of a sudden, he added, "Well, unless they have googly eyes, anyway. But back to my brother!"

"What about your brother?" I demanded. "Why get so worked up over something so stupid?"

He gave me a serious expression, one I never would've imagined seeing on his oddly chiseled face, and one that shut me up instantly. "It's when he does preposterous things like collecting socks that I wonder what he would do without such a cool guy taking care of him, that's all!" As quickly as his mood shift came, he returned to his normal, not-depressed self. For better or for worse. "Onward, human, your next puzzle awaits!"

That was it? He just dropped the "I'm worried about the current state and affairs of my family" bomb on me with no provocation at all, then tried to hurry me forward again like nothing happened. What, did he want me to say something comforting, like "I'm sorry you and your brother are equally hopeless?" Because nothing was coming to mind.

At first, I was about to comment on how Papyrus could barely feed himself, let alone take care of someone else. But then, I realized Sans probably wouldn't even remember to feed himself if Paps didn't constantly chew his proverbial ear off. In that way, the two bounced off each other pretty well. Unfortunately, that left my well-spirited insult bank pretty dry.

"Never saw you as someone to actually...you know, _care_ about other people, Paps," I finally teased, at a loss for better words.

The Mediocre Papyrus looked every other way, as if I could be talking about anyone else. "ME?!" he bellowed, throwing a hand over his chest in defense. "Why, of COURSE the Great Papyrus cares about those weaker than him, and especially my own blood! What kind of a Royal Guard member wouldn't!?"

 _Okay, now I can't even tell if you're being sarcastic or not._ "But you said you _aren't_ a member of the Royal Guard!" I persisted.

"Not YET!"

I sighed to myself. What was I even arguing about at this point, whether or not Papyrus cared about other people? Yeah, because I was certainly one to talk. "Alright, you win, but I still can't picture you as any knight in shining armor. Mainly because you're already in armor, and you look...kinda lame, but lets just go to the next puzzle!" I said quickly, trying to drop the conversation before he could launch into a ten-page counter argument about how he did not, in fact, look 'kinda lame.'

"KINDA LAME!?"

Oh God, I wasn't fast enough. He heard me. _Keep running, keep running!_

I didn't get very far, partially because of the wall of boulders almost blocking my way, and partially because of the row of spikes directly behind them _completely_ blocking my way. Although I'd only cast a glimpse at them so far, I could tell the boulders were arranged in an odd formation with more of those X switches in between them. Apparently, Paps was trying to ramp up the difficulty for this next puzzle. If it were anything like the others, however, then it would probably just be more time consuming than anything else.

"So, what's the deal with this next puzzle, bones for brains?" I called over my shoulder, preferring to hear his babbles about his latest con _trap_ tion over arguing about how cool he is.

Paps ran up beside me, nearly tripping over his own feet and toppling onto his puzzle. As funny as that'd be, he quickly corrected his posture. Bummer.

"Well, since you were taking such a long time to arrive..."

 _Long time?_ Was he joking? I had been right on his tail the whole time! I mean, unless you consider the countless delays due to spikes, chatting up the nice cream guy, and the multiple dog attacks...you know what, never mind.

"...I decided to improve this puzzle by arranging the snow to look more like my face."

"Now that sounds more like the Papyrus I know," I said out loud, without even realizing it.

"Unfortunately, the snow froze to the ground," he continued, looking completely disinterested all of a sudden. "So the solution is...completely different."

"And so does that," I muttered through both my teeth and my fingers. My hand had gone up to my face in an immediate face palm. Even the wind agreed with me, going completely silent in displeasure for the first time I could remember.

"Oh, no need to worry, Human!" Papyrus assured me, making the situation all the less assuring. "I, the Great Papyrus, will solve this conundrum! Then we can both proceed!"

"Well, yeah. Can't you just move the boulders again?"

Paps clicked his apparently existent tongue, looking annoyed. "Hmm...I would, but my lazybones brother doesn't seem to be anywhere around here, and we couldn't move them without him."

"Of course not." I jammed my hands into my pockets. "Look, I'll just try and solve the puzzle myself, you just sit there and...keep striking dramatic poses, or, whatever it is you _do_."

"My specialty!"

With that out of the way, I turned back to the puzzle and squeezed through the closest opening I could find. To Papy's very little credit, the boulders were arranged in a shape that at least _vaguely_ resembled his misshapen, fleshless face. It was sort of like a smaller, more boring version of a corn maze I did when I was little (that's what the grown-ups called it, anyways, because the lack of actual corn fields in a five hundred mile radius made that concept just a little bit harder to pull off.) The X switches were aligned in rows created by the boulders, leaving absolutely zero space to cut through and cheat the puzzle entirely. If they were just a tiny bit shorter and a little less slippery I could probably hop them, but I had no such luck. My dreams of Papyrus designing an actually interesting and/or easily solved puzzle were crushed like a pebble underneath a bulldozer. _Time to suffer through another classic Papyrus puzzle,_ I thought.

I weaved my way around the corners, stomping on every dark blue X I came across and turning them into red Os. After awhile, I fell into a sort of rhythm, hitting the tiles in quick succession. _Maybe suffer was a little harsh,_ I noted. _This is tedious at the worst, too easy to for suffering._

"Ah, dammit." The second the thought left my...mind, I guess, I found myself stuck between a rock and another rock. I'd just stepped on the second to last X, but the last one was right behind an O that I couldn't possibly avoid. I couldn't turn around without treading over a switch I'd already passed, and Papyrus had no way to reach the switch either, so I had to take the loss. With a sigh, I stepped on the O, locking it into the shape of a green triangle, leaving the puzzle unsolvable.

"Don't give up, human!" Papyrus cheered from the sidelines. I imagined some glossy red lipstick, a golden-blond pony tail, and a pair of sparkly pom-poms would suit him quite well. "The Great Papyrus is positive you can do it!"

"Glad you have so much faith in my abilities." _To solve your crappy freaking puzzle,_ I finished in my head.

I marched back out of the boulders to hit the switch that reset all the tiles and started again from square one, entering from a different point this time. It started out feeling exactly the same, hitting the switches with no problems, until I realized I was walking myself into the same trap again. The last X lied on the opposite side of the maze, surrounded by already pressed O switches.

"Ugh. Round three..." I grumbled, feeling my temper start to rise. Having a lanky skeleton stare at you with that wide, toothy grin the entire time didn't exactly help to calm me down, either.

I kept working on the puzzle until it felt like I'd been there for hours. No matter how many times I attempted to solve it, no matter where I entered from, no matter what pattern I moved in, I kept coming up just one infuriating X short. Eventually I gave in and tried moving the boulders myself, but Papyrus had been right for once. It didn't budge.

"How the hell did Sans move these, with a fork lift?" I asked, out of breath.

"Veeeeeeeerrry carefully," Papyrus explained.

"Oh, yeah, of course. How silly of me for not realizing sooner."

 _Fail. Fail. Fail, fail, mega-fail, FAIL._ In the name of all that was spaghetti, why couldn't I figure it out? The answer seemed to be screaming me in the face, just out of arms reach, but I couldn't quite grab hold of it.

"Are you sure this is even _solvable?_ " I cried after failing for the twenty-third time in a row (oh yeah, I was counting.)

Papyrus scratched his chin as he examined the puzzle, deep in thought. "Maybe."

"MAYBE!? Don't tell me I'm wasting all my damn time on a maybe!"

"I STILL believe in you, human, don't give up!"

Now red-hot, I gave it a few more attempts, not even bothering to pay attention to where I was going anymore. After awhile it felt like I knew the position of every individual switch like the back of my hand. Each attempt ended in total failure, until...

...No, I had to be imagining it. But when I double-checked, I found I every single switch had been turned into an O. I just had absolutely no way to get out without treading over another one, ruining the puzzle.

"Papyrus!" I yelled. "I got it, Hit the switch!"

"Hmm?" _God dammit Paps, now is the not the time to act..._ _well, like yourself!_ "OH, right!" Papyrus leaped to his feet and jogged over to the gray pleasure plate, making extra careful to trip over it as he planted it into the ground. A loud click filled in the air, and all the Os surrounding me turned a permanent light-green color. A moment later and the spikes hid back in their holes like a group of moles.

"About time! I was starting to worry I'd have to use you as a bridge to get across those spikes," I mumbled.

"Well done human!" Papyrus clasped my shoulder in approval, choosing to ignore my little 'use you as a bridge' comment. "I'm truly impressed! You must care about puzzles as much as I do!"

"Uh...yeah, something like that," I more-or-less agreed, shrugging his hand off. "I guess I do have to give you props. That puzzle was _way_ harder than the last ones you left out for me."

"Truly? Then the next puzzle may not be so easy AFTER ALL!" Papyrus then exited in a completely normal fashion; his usual combination Wicked Witch of the West's cackle with the sad laugh of a clown as he stomps off to prep his next puzzle. This time, I didn't lose any sleep on following him out. I was practically charging right on his heels after him.

...And directly into my favorite shady, skeletal drug dealer.

"Good job solving the puzzle...well, technically you didn't solve it quickly at all, but good job solving the puzzle," Sans said, flashy me his toothy grin and a thumbs up.

I didn't even slow down to talk to him. "No thanks to you, Skeletor," I goaded as I past him.

"Fine by me! I love doing absolutely nothing!" Sans replied, not even bothering to chase after me. I'm sure he'd find yet another way bullshit way to catch up. He always did.

Just in front of me, I spotted Papyrus stumbling over a little bridge with Sans standing on the other side.

 _...Time out, how the hell did he do that?!_ Shortcuts were one thing, teleportation was another. He'd only left my line of sight for a split second before I left him in the dust, and somehow he'd already emerged ahead of us, toting that same annoying grin that could be hiding any number of secrets..

"Alrighty, Human!" Papyrus fell in line beside his brother and a weird device that looked just a _little_ bit too much like a vending machine. An array of gray, black, and white tiles that would seem out of place anywhere but on a dance floor lined the ground in the shape of a square. There was no way to get across to the skelebros without stepping over them.

Sans was hiding something, no doubt about it, but I doubted I would get any straightforward answers if I went digging for them. Especially not with both of the skeletons sticking together like glue. I decided to leave the answers up in the air. For now.

"I get it. You couldn't find anyone who'd take you to the dance, so you turned it into a puzzle to make yourself feel better, is that it Paps?" I chuckled, waving off the challenge as a joke.

"You are gravely mistaken, Human," Papyrus countered, glaring daggers at me. "This puzzle was designed by the great Doctor Alphys!"

"Yet another name that means _absolutely nothing_ to me."

"PRECISELY!" He heroically strolled over to his vending machine, placing a finger over one of the buttons. From here, it almost looked like he was shuddering in anticipation, like a mad scientist about to unveil his latest devious contraption to the world. Meanwhile, Sans, as usual, stood off to the side picking his nose hole and wearing a face that said 'I couldn't care less if you paid me.' "Once I throw this switch, all of the tiles in front of you will begin to change color!"

"Translation; it's about to get funky up in here?" I offered, trying to look equally as uninterested as Sans for the sake of ticking off Paps even more.

"NO! IN FACT, 'FUNKINESS' LEVELS WILL BE AT AN ALL-TIME LOW!" _Well, that plan was working like a charm._ Papyrus regained his composure before continuing. "Each color has a completely unique function!"

Full disclosure; I had absolutely no idea what the hell Papyrus was even trying to tell me at this point. My best guess is that he was attempting to explain the rules of the puzzle and the function of each color tile, but I barely caught even _half_ of what he was spewing at me. Hell, even if I tried to write it down I'd probably just end up with a series of incoherent scribbles. Maybe he was going too fast, or maybe I was just an idiot, but this was the most I could make out.

"Red tiles are impassable, you cannot walk on them! Yellow tiles are electric, and will shock you! Green tiles are alarm tiles! If you step on them...orange tiles are...they make you smell nutritious...blue wafer tiles, swim through if...the piranhas will smite you...if smell tile, water will also zap chew...purple tiles are slappy, you will slide to a nail file...the slippery slope sells like lemons...pirahnas do not fight...Finally, pink tiles!(?) They don't do anything. Step on them all you like." Smiling brightly, he added, "How was that!? Do you understand?"

"...What?"

"Great! Then there's one last thing!"

 _There's more!?_ My brain was moaning in agony, and he was still dumping information on me as if I was an _actual_ landfill. And guess who was still standing there smiling to himself, with his hands in the pockets of his hoodie, watching the whole situation unfold before him?

"This puzzle is entirely random! Not even _I_ will know the solution!"

 _Oh, hell no._ I got ready to sprint across the tiles before he could flip the switch, but that one moment of hesitation completely screwed me over. Laughing like it was the end of the world, Papyrus pressed a button on the machine, and a low rumbling sound filled the air. The tiles had begun flipping to random colors, each formation they settled on looking more terrifying than the last. The sound kept growing louder and louder as the tiles changed faster and faster, until they finally settled on a pattern.

"Oh, hell no." All the colors of the damn rainbow were accounted for, and a mess of reds, greens, blues, purples, pinks, and yellows lay sprawled out before me like the inside of a toddler's coloring book. I couldn't even keep focus on any one tile, because the bright neon colors were far too distracting.

I glanced back up at Sans for guidance, but even he looked completely stumped, offering a lazy shrug as help. Papyrus, on the other hand, seemed to be having the time of his god damn life, laughing maniacally and hopping up and down on the snow. "Good luck, Human!" he mocked, not even trying to keep a straight face.

"Is it too late to get that explanation again?!" I cried, but my words were lost in the obnoxious humming of the machine. If the bits and pieces I got from Papyrus' ramblings were any indication, then stepping on some of these tiles would be frigging painful. Whoever this "Doctor Alphys" was, I had no doubt they were an actual raving-mad scientist in real life.

 _No point stalling any longer. Lets get this over with._ Cautiously, I slid my foot over the first tile in front of me, thankfully a pink one. From there, I had a choice of a blue, a red (which really wasn't a choice at all), and a purple, which would...slap me, maybe? Had I heard that correctly? I mean, it was better than a face-full of pirahnas, so...

I attempted to move over to the red tile, curious to see what made it so "impassable a about it." Nothing, really, except for the unexplainable force that kept me from putting my foot down at all. Could I jump it?

"Whoa whoa whoa!" I'd taken an extra step back directly onto a purple tile, and my foot completely slid out from under me. I ended up sliding onto a...

"OW, DAMMIT!" I suddenly felt all the pain I'd caused Papyrus earlier with that shocking orb clawing through my body, because I had fallen right on top of a yellow tile. Scrambling to get off it, I climbed back onto the purple tile and slid back to square one. Literally. "Slippery, not slappy..." I cursed myself. My ass felt like it was on fire, and for some reason I smelled lemony, but all my clothes were thankfully still intact from the shock.

"Uh...Human, would you care for some assistance?" Papyrus asked weakly, his voice barely audible thanks to the ringing in my ears, and the hum of the machine. Apparently, even _he_ wasn't enjoying his sweet revenge against me for all the teasing I'd done.

"How 'bout you turn the damn thing off?!" I yelled back.

"But...but I still need to capture you! The Royal Guard requests it!" He sounded hesitant, but it was hard to tell.

 _Looks like I'm still on my own._

I turned back to look around at my options, but between my head spinning so much and my heart threatening to burst out of my ribcage - both from the volts of electricity - I couldn't quite think straight. The functions of the tiles I actually remembered kept getting mixed up in my head. I was a sitting duck in a pond of acid.

Eventually I decided on wading through a blue _water_ tile, against every instinct yelling at me not to go swimming in the freezing cold. I stepped out of that onto a purple tile, which slid me over to an orange tile, forcing the smell of freshly peeled oranges into my nostrils. It only served to confuse me even more.

How many was that, three? Four? I was about halfway across, but the second half of the puzzle had tons of red and yellow tiles guarding the other side. I would need to maneuver through a ton more shit just to get around the red tile in front of me. _God dammit Papyrus, why couldn't you just stick to the X and O puzzles instead of using that damned machine..._

 _Wait...the machine!_

I pulled the Almighty Stick out and pointed it towards the glorified toaster oven, judging the distance between me and it. If I threw hard enough, I might be able to hit the right button to disable the tiles altogether.

"What are you doing with that, Human?"

I ignored him entirely. It was either suffering through five more rounds of getting electrocuted, or skipping it entirely at the risk of losing my last existing friend, who'd gotten me out of countless bad situations. Who'd been there for me no matter what monster we encountered. Who...

 _...Get a hold of yourself, it's a stick!_

I reared back and chucked it as hard as I could. As it shot through the air on its way to its target, I couldn't help but hold my breath. The hum of the machine became a background noise, and the bright lights of the tiles see to fade into nonexistence. The only things in the world were the stick and the machine.

...And Papyrus' face, which the stick collided with _before_ ricocheting off and smacking into the face of the machine head-on.

"Bullseye!" I cheered against Papyrus' wails of pain. Sparks started to fly as the machine short-circuited, and all the tiles deactivated at once, returning to their original monochrome state. I was free to move forward again, all thanks to the Almighty Stick.

Everything was all kittens and rainbows until I spotted the stick again, hurtling off the cliff.

"SHIT!" It was like I'd been filled with another five hundred volts of electricity. I charged after the doomed stick, shoving aside the skeleton brothers, but it was too late. It had already fallen way too far to grab. I watched in silence as it clambered against the tops of the first trees it hit and disappeared beneath the canopy.

"You never cease to impress me with your cunning, Human..." Papyrus muttered, rubbing his sore eye socket.

I hadn't heard him. Even though every rational part of me knew it was just an inanimate object, and that I should just let it go, I couldn't. Not yet, anyways. It was more special than that. At the very least, I should've felt sentimental about it. It really had come in handy more times than I could count on one hand. And now it was gone.

"Kid? You okay?" I heard Sans ask.

"...Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine," I finally said, turning away from the cliff. I even laughed, just a little bit. Because, for some reason, it seemed to help. "Just needed a second. That last shock felt like it was microwaving my intestines."

Sans nodded, seemingly accepting my answer. "Well, you go on ahead. I'll meet up with you guys later."

Papyrus nodded too, still rubbing away at his injury. "Indeed, brother. After all, he only has _two_ more trials to overcome!" After that, he sped off again, no doubt to prepare his...final puzzles? Was that really it? Felt like I'd never see the end of those a moment ago, and now...it felt like saying goodbye to an old friend. Not a close friend, more like the kind you keep around to boost your self-esteem, but a friend nonetheless.

I forced myself to keep moving past a large plain covered with what I could only assume were failed attempts at snowmen with a single guard post, presumably belonging to the speechless dog I'd played fetch with earlier. Back when I had the stick...

"A dog rushed in here, trying to build a snowdog that expressed its inspiration," explained a weird humanoid deer monster standing nearby, who had noticed me staring at the spiraling pillars and abandoned dog heads of snow in utter confusion. "But as it built, it kept getting more and more excited about the sculpture. It added more and more snow, until..." She trailed off, seeming very distant all of a sudden. Now it was her turn to look at the pathetic remains of the sculpture. "It was rather sad to watch, but I couldn't turn away."

"Okay," I said nonchalantly, waving her off like a pesky fly. "Did I ask you? No? Bye, then." I pushed past her, ignoring her deadly glare that followed me as I left.

A little farther down the path was another puzzle with the X and O switches, this time laid out over a large patch of ice. Since I knew the ice was there that time, I was able to slide over to each switch without any problems, turning them each into Os. After that, the path forward opened up, and it was one more straight slide back over to stable ground. The ice was a lot more bearable when you weren't and stumbling and falling on your ass every two seconds, I can say that for sure. _Only one more puzzle,_ I thought.

I passed by a snow sculpture of Papyrus on my way across the ice, meticulously crafted to look as much like him as possible (with some added muscles that I'm sure totally existed in real life,) as well as a tiny pile of snow right beside it with "Sans" carved into it. Which, was actually a much more accurate depiction of the person who made it than Papyrus'. I guessed the brothers would enjoy playing around in the snow a lot, 'cause living in a place like this made next to no sense otherwise. Granted, nothing ever _did_ make sense whenever those two were around.

"Feels like every step I take, I'm getting pushed back another two," I muttered to myself as I entered yet _another_ field with piles of snow more common than litter on the side of a freeway. These didn't look like the tragic failures of an over-excited dog, though, they just looked like regular, boring-old piles. "I am so frigging sick of freezing my ass off! At least the Ruins didn't go on for-freaking-ever!"

I was so busy complaining to myself I almost missed a tiny white dog pop its head and tail out of the snow in front of me.

I stopped the second I heard it barking at me, a tiny squeak of a sound that I barely even heard at first. No wonder it blended in so well, because its fur was pretty much the exact same shade of white as the snow bank it came out of. I should've noticed the beady black eyes pulsating with excitement.

"Sorry puppy, but I'm all out of sticks. Beat it," I said coldly, preparing to march right past it. But nothing was ever that easy down here in the Underground, so of _course_ when I approached, it busted out of the snow bank entirely as a behemoth of a dog towering over me with its own set of shiny metal armor. Not to mention the spear big enough to poke a Kentucky-sized hole in my chest.

"Hey, hey, if you're interested in a game of fetch, there's this really cool stick I know about!" I scrambled for the right words, backing away from the monster of a...monster before me. His bark rang through the air again, this time sounding more like an orchestra comprised solely of bass drums rather than the piccolo squeak from before. If he understood what I was saying, he didn't bother to listen.

I kept backing away slowly, careful not to take my eyes off it, as it readied its spear and began to advance. I quickly tumbled out of the way of its first stab, the sharp end coming way too close for comfort.

"Dammit, why did I have to throw the Almighty Stick?!" I started to panic, scanning the area for anything else to distract the dog with. I couldn't possibly hurt it with my dinky little toy knife, not through the armor anyway, and there wasn't anything around me besides a tiny dog house and the piles of snow. _Maybe I can build myself an igloo and hide out there until he gets bored and leaves._

While I was distracted, the dog got close enough to lunge at me again. I wasn't quite fast enough this time, and the blade cut through my hoodie and left a bloody gash on my elbow.

I winced from the pain, wracking my brain for a solution. _What else do dogs like besides fetch? Getting pet? But he's too damn tall..._

 _...Okay, so then what so they hate? Cats? Squirrels? Being ignored?!_

And then it hit me. I had to get him to come even closer.

Taking a ginormous risk, I turned my back to the dog and went completely lax, ignoring it entirely. Secretly, I was anticipating another swing, but what the mutt didn't know would most certainly hurt him.

Sure enough, after a bark of confusion, the dog lowered his head to me in an attempt to figure out why I refused to pay him any attention.

"Gotcha!" I whipped around and threw my hand over his head, dragging my fingers through his fur furiously. The dog yelped at my sudden affection, rolling onto the ground with his stomach and his legs dangling wildly in the air. Watching his oversized pink tongue flop all over the place with spit hanging off of it wasn't exactly charming, but considering the alternative, I may as well have been staring at the Mona Lisa.

"Who's a good dog?" I said in a sickly sweet voice as I dragged my hand through his mangy fur coat. "Who's a retarded little shit?" It didn't seem to realize I was insulting it, and just kept barking excitedly all the same. "That's right, you are! You are!"

After pet levels finally reached one-hundred percent, he hopped back to his feet and clambered off the way he came, and the way I was headed. But not before leaving me with one final gift.

A huge, affectionate, slobbery, vomit-inducing lick right on my face.

"...You know what, I don't care anymore," I muttered, attempting to wipe the saliva off on my sleeve. "It beats being covered in blood, at least."

Beyond the snow bank laid a long, rickety wood bridge strung up by a couple of ropes swaying in the wind. Long story short, it appeared ready to snap and fall into the chasm it hung over at any moment. I tried to find any other way across, but the fastest and most direct way was across the bridge. Unless I wanted to add another two hour diversion trekking through a bunch of spiny evergreen trees, this was my best bet.

"I mean, there's no sign of that giant dog, so he must've gone across the bridge, right?" I tried to convince myself. It wasn't working. "If it held him, it'll definitely hold me."

Holding my breath like it was the last one I'd ever take, I planted my first step onto the board. It creaked slightly under my weight, but felt strong enough to support me. I held onto the rope and jumped up and down a couple of times just to be sure. Satisfied, I started to make my way across. I didn't dare to release my grip on the cords.

 _Why did it have to be windy?_ The bridge constantly swayed back and forth in the breeze like a pendulum, threatening to tip at any moment. Made it pretty hard to concentrate on anything _but_ falling to my death.

It wasn't until I was on the last quarter stretch when I glanced up long enough to see the skeleton brothers standing on the other end.

"Human! This is your _final_ and most _dangerous_ challenge!" yelled Papyrus, waving his arms around like he was trying to conduct and orchestra, and failing miserably.

I didn't slow my approach at all, desperately seeking solid ground again. "Walking? _That's_ your final challenge?" I hoped he couldn't see my teeth chattering.

For the first time, Papyrus actually succeeded in making his voice sound like one to be reckoned with. "BEHOLD! THE GAUNTLET OF TERROR!"

At the sound of his voice, weaponry of all kind came swinging in on chains, from maces with lethal looking spikes to flamethrowers to spears to cannons to...a random normal-looking dog tied to a rope. All of them hung in front of me to either side of the bridge, threatening to move in for the kill at any moment. "Gauntlet of Terror" was easily the most appropriate name that could've been given to this obstacle.

"When I say the word," Papyrus continued, the light of the flamethrower casting an intimidating shadow over half of his face. "It will fully activate! Cannons will fire! Spears will swing! Blades will slice!"

God, it was like listening to the chant of a deranged cult rather than the usual babbling that came out of his mouth. Who knew Paps had it in him to be genuinely intimidating? If I hadn't been ready to piss my pants at the sight of all that weaponry, I would've been impressed.

"Only the _tiniest_ chance of victory will remain!"

"I never said you had to roll out the red carpet for me, Paps," I said in one last, desperate attempt to get him to call it off. Between the gash on my arm and my head still feeling the effects of the zap, my odds of getting through that gauntlet seemed pretty slim.

But he was too caught up with himself to hear me. "Are you ready!?"

 _No._

"BECAUSE I!"

"Papyrus, please!"

"AM!"

"Let's talk about this!"

"ABOUT!"

"Shit!"

"TO DO IT!"

I screamed and got ready to dodge the first spear or blast of fire that came my way, but strangely...nothing happened. Papyrus was still standing there proudly, ready to destroy me, but none of the traps made any move to maim me.

"Well? What's the holdup?" asked Sans, speaking up for the first time. I shot him a glare that screamed, _are you trying to get me killed?_

"Holdup!? What holdup?" Papyrus wailed, facing...away from me now. "I'm...I'm about to activate it now!"

 _No way. Was he having second thoughts?_ Sure enough, everything remained completely stationary. _But why? What about his precious 'Royal Guard' status?_

"That, uh, doesn't look very activated," Sans observed keenly.

Papyrus turned back to face me, placing a hand on the end of the bridge. The fire in his eyes was completely gone. He looked just like the goofball I'd come to be acquainted with again. "Well...this challenge, it seems...maybe too easy to defeat the human with."

I was shocked. Thankfully not from another yellow tile, but that he was actually making excuses for not killing me on the spot. He had me right where he wanted me after all this time, but deemed it "too easy."

...I wasn't sure exactly how to feel about that. I guess relieved was one of them, as the weapons slowly began to retract back into their hiding places.

"Yeah!" Papyrus agreed with himself. "We can't use this one! I am a skeleton with standards! My puzzles are very fair, and my traps expertly cooked!"

Smiling, I added, "You can bet your ass they are!" You couldn't be too careful with Papyrus, he might change his mind at any moment.

"Even the Human admits they were too easily bested!" Papyrus pointed out. For once, I didn't argue. "There's no class at all! AWAY IT GOES!"

I let out the breath I'd been holding as the last of the traps disappeared, and the random dog with them. With nothing standing in my way, I crossed over to the other side of the bridge, never feeling happier than when I stood back on solid ground.

"Another decisive victory for Papyrus!" he cheered, looking more confused than anything else. I guess he hadn't fully accepted he had opted to save my life instead of performing his one duty. "Nyeh...Heh...Heh?" Casting one last look at me, he ran forward, leaving me and Sans alone.

"I guess you were right about your brother," I said to Sans once I was sure Papyrus was out of earshot. "He really isn't dangerous at all, even when he tries to be."

"Yep," was all Sans said in response. "Told ya."

We stood at a bit of stalemate for a moment, neither of us knowing what to say. I finally spoke up after the silence started to hurt. "Thanks."

Sans raised an eye socket, stretching his arms above his head as if he couldn't care less. "For what?"

"For the help. For the hoodie, I guess. Thanks."

For some reason, he wouldn't quite meet my gaze. "Don't mention it."

Satisfied with our "conversation," I turned back on the path and kept moving. I stopped when I, at last, found a sign of civilization. A literal big, neon sign out on the snow with Christmas lights lining the sides, simply reading;

 **Welcome to Snowdin!**


	15. Chapter 15: Snowdin

After being forced to trudge past nothing but trees, rocks, snow, dogs, and skeletons for the last five and a half hours, everything about this new town felt like a breath of fresh air. Actually, the events proceeding me stumbling into this town didn't matter at all in terms of it feeling fresh and new, because I'd never seen anything remotely like it in my life. I couldn't help but wander out into the middle of town, staring at everything as if I'd just crash landed on an alien planet. For the first time since waking up in the Underground, it felt like I was walking right through a dream.

The houses and buildings were small, old-fashioned hard wood often covered by bright snowy rooftops, as far from the cement and steel structures I'd grown up around as you could get. A warm orange candlelight flickered in every window instead of the harsh yellow from half-burnt out light bulbs in the city. But the actual surreal part that gave the town its dream-like qualities was, ironically, the things I was most familiar with. Multicolored Christmas lights dangled from every other cabin and even some of the thick evergreen trees, piercing through the haziness left by an earlier light snowfall, like sunlight through the dawn.

"Enjoying your little sight-seeing adventure there, kid?"

Enjoying? I mean, it was hard to tell, I was still trying to make a heads or tails of the emotions rushing through my brain. Enjoyment was probably somewhere lost in the mix, underneath total confusion, amazement, and overwhelment.

"Holy shit," I said plainly, finally recognizing the voice as Sans. He'd appeared behind me while I was gawking at everything the town had to offer. Which wasn't really much at all, as it appeared fairly small, but still enough to be dumbfounding.

Sans snickered at me, gesturing at everything around himself lazily. "Welcome to Snowdin. And, just a little tip, you might wanna wipe that look off your face. You're freaking out the locals."

Sans' jab snapped me back to reality. Sure enough, when I spun around to make sure he wasn't messing with me, I was met with the either accusing or downright baffled looks from 'the locals.' Thankfully there were only a few, a couple of rabbits and a larger than life grizzly bear, and none of them appeared ready to rip me limb from limb. Yet.

"Uh...they aren't gonna gang up and burn me at the stake witch-style, right?" I asked Sans in a hushed whisper, just to be safe.

He shrugged. "Probably not."

 _Well, that's reassuring,_ I thought.

"If anyone asks, just tell 'em you're a monster from the Capital, okay kid?"

"Won't have to tell me twice," I promised. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed some of the monsters returning to business as usual, hustling and bustling through the snow with their own places to be. They must have figured that I wasn't much of a threat if I was talking with Sans so casually. "Being gutted like a fish by an angry crowd of bunnies isn't all too high on my bucket list." I reached into my back pocket and pulled out one of my shiny gold coins. "Any idea where I could blow...I mean, _responsibly_ spend some of this cash? And, I dunno, maybe not starve?"

He shrugged again, which was probably his only method of moving the conversation along any further. "Maybe at the cabin conveniently labeled 'shop' that you passed by on your way in here?"

 _Crap._ "Uh...yeah...right," I muttered weakly, slipping past Sans. And avoiding any and all eye contact, while I was at it.

An obnoxiously cheery bell rung overhead as I pushed open the door with a grunt and a wave of heat smacked me clean across the face. An orange glow illuminated the cabin, which turned out not to be a candle, but an old-fashioned fireplace off to the side. It wasn't very roomy, downright claustrophobic even, and there were pieces of total junk tossed here and there like seven fingered gloves, suspicious looking vials of green liquid, dusty old books bigger than an encyclopedia, and...I honestly couldn't tell _what_ was wriggling in the sealed black garbage bag, but I'd tolerate anything for a roaring fire after tracking through the snow for hours.

At the sounds of the bell ringing and the door clanging shut, a woman tossed her head up from behind a counter, her rabbit ears flopping around carelessly. "Well, hi!" she sang, leaning over the counter with a smile brighter than the fire pit. She wore a simple white tank top, hat, and a pearl necklace. "Haven't seen your face 'round here before, at least, not that I can recall. You some kind of traveler?"

I didn't say anything right away, taking a moment to bask in the heat of the flames. My thoughts instantly flooded back to Toriel and her cottage, but I fought them off as quickly as they came. "I guess you could say that," I said at last, leaning against the brick fireplace absentmindedly. "I'm...uh...from the Capital!"

 _Smooth, double-o-seven,_ I chastised myself.

Thankfully, she didn't seem to pick up on the lie. Instead, she seemed genuinely surprised. "Really? I'd say we're no strangers to strangers around here, but it's actually been a mighty long time since I've seen a fresh face in town." She offered me a handshake, which I willingly accepted. Her borderline southern accent was a tad annoying, but I'd come across far, _far_ more annoying monsters than her already. "Welcome to Snowdin! How can I help ya, little lady?"

"Still a dude," I corrected, sighing internally. It felt like I should've been angrier, but the weird effect seeing Snowdin for the first time was still hanging around me like a cloud of insects. _Was it really that hard to tell? Or are these guys just_ that _clueless about what humans look like?_

"Oh! My apologies. How can I help ya, _sir_?"

"That's what I'm here to figure out," I admitted, shifting a little bit closer to the counter. "I guess...food couldn't exactly hurt right about now. I've been starving myself on candy, pie, cookies and ice cream for like, two days now."

"Shut your trap! Are you serious?" For a second, I feared I'd done something to offend her, but the look on her face was more of concern than anything else. Without another word, she spun around and fished something out below the counter top. I glanced at the door wondering if I should've gotten the hell out of there, but when she lifted her head back up, it was definitely no weapon in her hand. "Here, eat up, Hun. This cinnamon bunny's on the house. It's a special recipe of mine. And, keep this between you and me. No need for your parents to be up in arms over me feeding you a little sugar," she added with a wink.

"Yeah, you won't have to worry about my parents," I scoffed. I eyed the warm pastry sitting in her hand for a moment, debating whether or not to take her up on the offer. It had all the components of a regular cinnamon roll: frosting, cinnamon (duh,) and the works, but it had the added flare of coming in the shape of one of those chocolate bunnies people have around Easter.

"There's no...uh...actual bunnies in it, right?" I asked, not willing to take any chances. Seriously, those spider cookies were gonna haunt me for life.

The shopkeeper stared at me as if I'd just straight-up murdered her entire family. "The hell kind of store do you think this is, stranger? I ain't no cannibal!"

"Alright, sorry!" I hurriedly took the cinnamon bun from her, explaining the whole spider cookie situation in between bites just to make sure we stayed on good terms. I conveniently left out the part about the Ruins, so she wouldn't figure out I was lying about coming from the Capital. Wherever the hell _that_ was, hopefully not on my way back to the surface.

She seemed much less insulted after I finished the story, although I may have been too busy enjoying the crap out of the cinnamon bun to be paying any attention. It was sweet, soft, and cooked a perfect golden brown, so pretty much as good as physically possibly, with the added bonus of healing that nasty gash on my elbow. SO good in fact that I didn't even stop to question how a cinnamon bun was any healthier than the junk I'd already been eating.

Still leagues worse than a butterscotch-cinnamon pie, though.

"If ya ever need another bite to eat, grab one over at Grillby's," the shopkeeper suggested. "It's just down the street from here. Although I wouldn't expect anymore handouts from those guys. In fact, you're lucky I gave you anything."

"Got it. Thanks for that," I said, wiping the last crumbs from the cinnamon bun off my face.

"Anything else I can interest you in?" she offered. "Maybe...something that fits you a little better?"

It took me a moment to realize she was talking about the hoodie. "Oh, yeah, it's not mine." I tugged at the sleeve, as if that made it even more clear that it didn't belong on my skin. Or any skin, technically.

"Mm hmm," she hummed, tapping her fingers on the desk as if she couldn't wait to sell me something for real. "I thought I'd seen it on one of those skeleton fellas. Sans, I think?"

"Yep. He's a...good friend of mine." _We'll call that one a half-lie.  
_

"Really? Then you wouldn't happen to know where those jokers came from, would ya?" she inquired, placing a large sealed chest on the counter with a loud _thunk_ and the clamber of what looked to be a screwdriver. "I lost the key to this awhile ago, so you'll have to bear with me."

"Whatever. And about the skeletons? Sorry. No clue." So the skeleton brothers weren't from around here, either? "I kinda figured they'd always lived around here."

 _That's right, keep half-lying. Just keep digging yourself into that ditch you hopefully won't ever have to claw your way out of._

"Well, then you'd always thought wrong, stranger," she sighed, twiddling with her screwdriver before plunging it into the chest's keyhole. "Those goofballs just showed up one day, and kinda...asserted themselves." Her face pinched, as if a skunk had somehow snuck in here and sprayed the whole place. "Things have certainly been a lot more _interesting_ since then."

I smirked at her. "Lemme guess; That's the 'nice' way of putting it?" Did these people need to weave their way through Papyrus' puzzles and traps every single _day_? 'Cause I would probably flip at around day three, let alone day thirty-three, let alone day three-hundred and thirty-three. By then the entire town's population probably would've been lost in the first Snowdin Chainsaw Massacre.

She offered a shrug and not much else. "Beats nothin' ever happening at all, I suppose." With one last grunt, she finally managed to pop the top off the chest. "Alrighty, lets see what we got here."

I waited in silence as she fumbled with the contents of the chest, all of a sudden feeling really eager to change out of Sans' hoodie. The smell of dried up ketchup and other condiments really starts to get on your nerves after awhile, and it fit about as well as that seven fingered glove sitting in the corner would on my awfully inadequate five fingered hand.

"Here's what I got for ya. Take a look." She dropped the pile of shirts and jackets on the counter without even looking at me.

The shirt on the top of the pile immediately caught my eye. It was a simple blue sweater, wool from the look of it, with light purple stripes that complemented the original color like peanut butter to jelly. Felt soft, too, and was almost exactly my size.

"I think this'll do nicely," I said after a minute.

She held up the sweater by the collar. "This one?"

Now it was my turn to turn up my nose. "Hell no! I wouldn't be caught dead, alive, or in limbo wearing that thing! The one _under_ it."

I held up my actual choice, a dark gray zip-up fleece with jet black sleeves, which seemed to be just my size. It was a little worn and dusty for sure, but there were more pockets and about one hundred percent less ketchup stains, so the choice ended up being pretty trivial. I threw off the hoodie and pulled on the fleece over my T-shirt just to be sure.

"A perfect fit," I boasted.

"That's all fine and dandy, but can ya pay for it?" challenged the shopkeeper, wearing another, sharper smile on her face. She held out her paw, thinking up a price I was positive I wouldn't be able to afford. "...You know what, that old thing's been sitting locked up collecting dust for the longest time. I'll give it to ya for forty gold. No more, no less."

 _Seriously? If the ice cream was fifteen, then I'm basically robbing this woman blind._ "Deal." I checked my pockets for the money, coming up with one-O-five gold. The extra forty must've come from a pile left by that behemoth of a dog after I'd conquered it.

A moment later, I spent another fifty gold on a bit of a risk, something called a 'tough glove.' It was a worn out, pink glove made of some kind of super-tough material. Basically, punching people would be like smacking them around with a brick, which would no doubt come in _handy_ at some point or another. _God damn puns are infecting my brain like the plague.  
_

A moment later and I was strutting out of the shop styling in my new digs and my fifteen remaining gold as if I owned the place. By which I mean staying within spitting distance of every building I passed to attract as little attention to myself as possible. Normally, I'd figure being a human in a monster-filled town would alert the entire frigging continent, but they still refused to pay me any mind. I never allowed myself to feel safe, though. All it took was for one random person to call me out on it, and they'd all come running in a huge pack like paparazzi. Except, instead of snapping terrible photos and _accidentally_ trampling whatever celebrity they're hopelessly chasing, the blatant murder would be completely intentional. And they'd probably get a kick out of it, too. And be let out onto the surface. And raise hell for every other human up there.

Probably best not to get recognized.

"I guess I should get this back to Sans..." I muttered to myself, tossing his hoodie up and catching it again. _Great job drawing absolutely no attention to yourself._ "Lets see...if I were the laziest skeleton known to mankind...monster-kind, where would I go to waste my time?"

I skipped over an inn the shopkeeper had suggested I stay at, figuring that'd be the last place I'd find him. Wasn't about to throw the last of my gold away losing sleep in a place full of monsters, either. Maybe at the-

"-Yo! You're a kid too right?"

I turned towards the ear-gratingly high pitched voice screeching at me from under a Christmas tree in the middle of the street. (Or whatever the hell they called their Christmas rip-off holiday down here.) A little monster stood under it, with pale yellow skin a few shades darker than the star topping the tree, and wimpy spikes running down his back, ending in a flimsy tail. I was halfway done forming a really devastating insult involving a velociraptor, a porcupine, and a cartoon character he reminded me of (although I couldn't quite think of whom) until I noticed something. Something _off_ about him.

The kid didn't have any arms under that striped candy-cane shirt of his.

"Who's asking?" I said instead, nearly stumbling over my words. Even _I_ wasn't about to directly insult the disabled. Especially not on...Christmas? "And what the hell is up with all the decorations around here? Were the jack-O-lanterns and fake cobwebs just _too_ expensive to work into the budget?"

The little punk gave me a look as if I was speaking in another language. "Huh? You mean the tree, the lights, and gifts?" He spoke in a hyper tone, probably from downing too much Christmas chocolate at once. "What, dude, is it your first time in town?"

"Yep. Literally my first time around the block," I confirmed. "Mind filling in the blanks for me, _kid_?"

He rolled his eyes at me, sulking closer to the bright lights. "Some jerks made fun of a dude who lives around here a few years back," he huffed. "They decorated its horns, so a bunch of the grown-ups started giving him presents to make him feel better." He jerked his head towards the presents. "So now we put gifts underneath a decorated tree every once in awhile."

I nodded. _Apparently it's not some dumb Christmas rip-off. It's a dumb original holiday that just looks like a Christmas rip-off._ "Great. Enjoy the free stuff," I said, turning to leave. After all, this hoodie wasn't about to return itself.

"Hey, wait!" he called after me. I didn't stop. "You didn't answer me earlier, man! Are you a kid too, or not!?"

"Sure, I'm a kid!" I yelled back, waving him off over my shoulder.

The last thing I heard him say was "COOL!"

I was back to looking for Sans, and stopped in front of yet another possibility for where he might be hanging out. And what was undoubtedly the most out-of-place _thing_ I'd ever seen _anywhere_.

A big orange sign taking up the entire upper half of the building read "Grillby's." The shopkeeper had recommended me to stop there if I was craving another bite to eat, but I quickly passed up the idea of entering there alone. It didn't seem like the kind of place to welcome strangers with open arms, between the stagnant "open" sign that should've probably been flashing colors, dark and cracked bricks that were slipping out of their cementation, and the distinct smell of alcohol flooding out of the windows. Even if Sans _was_ in there, I think I'd prefer just holding onto his smelly hoodie a little while longer over setting foot in that death trap.

The next stop on the road was much more inviting, at least by comparison. It was a smaller, simpler structure, and one I'd never heard of before on the surface. A sign over the door read "Librarby."

...I face-palmed when I realized they spelled it wrong. Not because the idiots running the library somehow managed to spell the name incorrectly, but because I didn't recognize the word even sooner. The irony there was just too rich to sift through.

Once I got over the most embarrassing spelling error since "Colombia" versus "Columbia," the idea of a monster library actually started to sound _really_ cool. I'd _shelved_ the idea of reading any monster related literature since poking through Toriel's dusty old bookshelf of snail facts and history books, but now I'd been given a second chance. Now, whether or not Sans would spend any time there...

...I'm sure the lazy bones appreciated a good book to kill some time on every now and then.

"Welcome to the library," droned the woman behind her desk as I opened the door. She looked like your typical librarian, tiny glasses, pinched face, wearing an ugly old sweater that went out of fashion thirty years ago. The only _minor_ difference was that she was a bird with dull green feathers. Like I said, minor. "And yes, we know the sign is misspelled," she cut me off the moment I opened my mouth.

 _How the hell did she know?_

All the bookshelves were shoved against the far wall, so it took just one look around the whole room to tell that Sans wasn't there. No one was really hanging around to begin with, aside from a few crusty old lady monsters sitting around a table, collecting dust faster than the books.

Oh well, it appeared Sans wasn't here either. What a shame. But wouldn't it be an even _greater_ shame if I passed up the opportunity to read some authentic monster literature? I _guess_ as long as I was here, I might as well check out some books. For science, or something.

The first that caught my eye turned out to be some ankle-biter's school report they left lying around on one of the shelves. "Monster Funerals," the title read. _Should be interesting, at least. Short too._

"Monster funerals, technically speaking, are cool as heck," I read aloud. _Wow, only one sentence in and I'm already rolling my eyes at how crap this is. Must be a new record._ "When monsters get old and kick the bucket, they turn to dust." _Gross._ "At funerals, we take that dust and spread it on that person's favorite thing." _Gross and weird._ "Then their...their essence will live on in that thing." _Because that's how logic works._ "Am I at the page minimum yet? I'm kinda sick of writing this." _God dammit._

After tossing that solid D- in the trash, where it rightfully belonged, I moved onto the next book. "Humans vs. Monsters: A study on...humans and monsters."

I flipped through this one pretty absentmindedly for awhile. Most of it came off as annoying anti-human hate speech, until I eventually came across something interesting. "While monsters are mostly made of magic, human beings are mostly made of water." _There's that word again. Magic. Must be a little bit cooler than yanking rabbits out of hats down here._ "Humans, with their physical forms, are far stronger than us." _What else is new? "_ But they will never know the joy of expressing themselves through magic." _Yeah, I wish. Swear to God I'm never sitting through another one of those shows again..._ "They'll never get a bullet-pattern birthday card..." _What?_

No matter how hard I scoured each shelf, I couldn't, for the life of me, find a single god damn novel in the entire library. Not that there were an overwhelming number of books to chose from, but seriously? Not even a crappy one written in, like, five days? There weren't any other tots who attempted to write a novel of their own? Did monsters even _write_ anything other than educational books?

 _Yeesh._ I shuddered at the thought. Having monsters leap out and try to kill you all the time was one thing, never being able to see the sun again was another, but living in a world without any actual writing? Count me out. Even scarier was the stink-eye the librarian was shooting me as I tore up the place looking for a novel. I made a mental note to pick up the place when I was done, because "death by librarian" was definitely in the top ten lamest ways to die. Even a monster librarian.

"Fearing the humans no longer, we moved out of our old city, HOME," I sighed, so desperate to flood my eyes with words I actually picked up another history book. "We braved harsh cold, damp swampland, and searing heat..." _Damn. If Snowdin is the harsh cold, then I still have a little ways to go before I get out of here. That is, if there's no other way out._ "...Until we reached what we now call our capital. 'New home.' Again, our king is really bad with names..." I chuckled at that last part, suddenly glad I decided on picking up another disappointment. I mean, book.

"Because they are made of magic, monsters' bodies are attuned to their SOUL." _The very culmination of their being._ "If a monster doesn't want to fight, its defenses will weaken. And the crueler the intentions of our enemies, the more their attacks will hurt us. Therefore, if a being with a powerful SOUL struck with the desire to kill..."

I slammed the book closed. That one left a foul taste in my mouth, as if I was physically swallowing one of Sans' puns.

...Still, in a grotesque way, it was reassuring to know that if it really came down between life and death, I could...deal with them quickly. No blood, no gore, no mess.

No problem.

I pulled one last book over to distract myself, and entertain my thoughts a little longer. "Love, hope, compassion...this is what people say monster souls are made of. But the absolute nature of "SOUL" is unknown. After all, humans have proven their souls don't need these things to exist."

Yep, and I'm officially done. I wasn't going to sit here and be berated just for existing any longer. I quietly slipped the book back, and without casting a single glance at anyone else around me, exited the Librarby.

 _Wait, what was I doing again?... Right, right! Where the hell is that damn skeleton?_

I started farther down the road, past a large colorful house with two mailboxes out in front - one overflowing with unread letters, and another one beside it that was emptier than my remaining patience. The lights were on, but the door was locked tight, and no one came to answer when I stood there banging at it for what felt like an hour, but was probably closer to thirty seconds. Eventually I gave up and kept searching, but the last structure on the path was an equally locked shed resting beside the house (believe me, I tried to pry that sucker open until my fingers felt like falling off).

So I kept trotting along merrily...minus the trotting...and the merriness, to the outskirts of town, where the path narrowed and the signs of civilization abruptly disappeared.

"Seriously, where is that pun-loving, slipper-wearing...brother-tolerating bastard?" I demanded of no one, making a futile attempt to brush oncoming snowflakes out of my face. The very instant I'd skipped town, little pellets of snow had begun to pepper the air. They kept gathering and gathering in clumps with more falling every second, until I could barely even make out the outline of trees a few feet in front of me. _Where are they even coming from?_ I asked myself. No clouds plus no moisture should've equaled no snow, but logic didn't mean crap when you were dealing with creatures made of magic, which had been proven to be true time and time again.

"What the hell am I doing?" I said at last, stopping dead in my tracks. There was absolutely no reason for me to be out here in this blizzard with snowflakes clinging to my hair and clothes like lice. Sans was nowhere to be found, and what reason did he have to be out here, anyway? I'd bet anything he was chilling at Grillby's, the one place I couldn't have been bothered to check, ignoring the snowstorm with a warm cup of hot chocolate and cracking puns to whoever was unfortunate enough to be within earshot.

But the second I turned away to trek back to town, defeated and quickly losing the feeling in my fingers, a figure emerged from out of the fog.

"Sans?" I called out of desperation. "Is that-"

"-Human," a familiar voice replied, muffled by the sound of the wind. "Allow me to tell you about some complex feelings."

I rolled my eyes, even though there was no way he could possibly see it. "Yeah, sure thing Papyrus, but how 'bout we talk about it later? Maybe _not_ in a massive blizzard?"

The self-proclaimed puzzle master was too far away to make out any facial details, but the shadow of his scarf-cape thing gave it away instantly. It was hard to tell from where I was standing, but it looked like he was scratching at his neck nervously.

"You see, that is precisely what we need to talk about." I was about to counter his statement by reminding him how much fun freezing to death was, but Papyrus was once again in that the zone of his. He kept talking faster and faster, flailing his arms around like an over the top actor at the silliest performance imaginable. And with each word that tumbled out of his mouth, I could've sworn the snow fell just a little bit quicker. "Feelings like the joy of finding another pasta lover, the admiration for another's puzzle-solving skills, and the desire to have a cool, smart person think you are cool. Those feelings...they must be _exactly_ what you are feeling right now!"

 _Yeah, we really are birds of a feather, aren't we? Moron. Get on with it, Papyrus, I can hear all about how great you are later,_ I mentally urged him.

"I can hardly imagined what it must be like to feel that way," he continued, switching to a more sympathetic tone. One that only served to piss me off even more.

"I'm sure you can," I muttered.

"After all, I am very great. I don't ever wonder what having lots of friends is like."

"I'm sure you _do_ ," I said, louder this time.

If he heard me, my words didn't do anything to deter his rambles. "I pity you...lonely human..."

And that was it. That was the last straw that broke the camel's back. The storm seemed to swirl on every side of us, drawn to my anger like moths to a very, very bright flame.

"Pity me?" I demanded, taking a step towards the cocky little bastard. "Do you know how God damn SICK I am of listening to you bitch and moan about your problems, blaming every last person, insect, or _snow particle_ for your problems?!"

"H-Human!?" Papyrus chattered, clearly startled by my sudden anger.

 _Good. He should be._

" _You_ are like a God damn leech, you know that?" I spat. It was so satisfying, to finally blow up at him. To let him know once and for all how everyone _really_ felt about him. Now _I_ was calling the shots. He had fallen into one of _my_ traps.

"You know why you don't have any friends?" I didn't stop approaching, and wouldn't. Not until I could see that blood boiling face of his clearly. "Because people don't give a single solitary shit about how _great_ you are. Because you only care about _yourself_." Finally, I was close enough to see his face recoiling in disgust, and pure confusion. "Because your cooking sucks ass. Because your brother is more fun to be around than you. Because you're an egotistical maniac who hides behind the illusion that he's better than anyone else."

Now, my face was mere inches from his. Never had I seen a creature so...so _pathetic_. Noodle arms, paper thin armor, and a face that had been lying to itself for so long.

"Reality check, Paps? You will _never_ be a member of the Royal Guard."

At first, neither of us moved. The words hung in the air beside the snowflakes. We stood there, probably frozen in the cold for a full, agonizing minute where neither of us knew how to continue.

 _...Why do I feel like such a piece of shit?_ Shouldn't it have been gratifying to sink my teeth into this walking cesspool of ego and aggravation? Shouldn't I have felt accomplished? Shouldn't I-

"-OW!" I stumbled back a few feet, clutching the injured part of my face with my left hand. Once I'd finally felt decent enough to stand again, the sight before me left me in a different kind of awe.

Papyrus was standing there on shaking legs, in the same place he'd been, panting heavily with a blood-stained bone in his hand. Looking horrified at himself. Staring st the place where he'd struck me as if the world were coming to an end over it.

I pulled my hand off my face. _Bloodstains._

"Very well, human," Papyrus finally spoke up, in a weak, unsteady, but dead serious voice. He dropped the bone to the ground without even glancing at it, already adding more to his clutches. "I had hoped we could have been friends...but I see now that this was a foolish wish."

 _Oh God. What have I done?_

I ignored my injury long enough to quickly slip the tough glove on one hand and my toy knife in the other, dropping Sans' hoodie and the bottle with the snow piece beside me. Ready to fight, more or less.

"...But thank you, Human, for I am no longer distracted from my _true_ goal." His normal goofy grin and wide, childish eyes were exchanged for an accusing glare and a horribly, horribly straight face. Taking a fighting stance, he finished, "I will capture you! THEN I WILL FULFILL MY LIFELONG DREAM!"

"POWERFUL!"

"POPULAR!"

"PRESTIGIOUS!"

"I'm gonna knock some sense into that thick skull of yours, Papyrus!" I said at last, taking an even worse fighting stance, the pain in my face screaming at me to stop. But what choice did I have?

"THAT IS PAPYRUS! THE NEWEST MEMBER OF THE ROYAL GUARD!"


	16. Chapter 16: Papyrus

Violent flurries of snow now spun around us in a raging vortex, sucking the light of of the air in a vacuum of sorts. It was next to impossible to see my enemy without shielding my eyes with one hand. I took an unsure swing at what I thought to be Papyrus' head, but he quickly stepped back, and my toy knife ultimately ended up bouncing uselessly off his chest piece. He stumbled away in an attempt to put some distance between us and chucked some bones at my face to keep me off him. Although, I hardly even had to move to avoid them due to his piss-poor aim. Most of them sailed uselessly off to either side of me, lost somewhere in the icy, dark storm.

"You can't run from me, Papyrus!" I chased after his rapidly disappearing figure as best as I could with the weight of the snow pulling at my ankles.

"The G-g-great Papyrus n-never runs from a fight!" he declared, adding another volley of bones as the icing on the cake. I ducked under them this time, closing the distance between me and the skeleton enough to deck him across the face with my tough glove. The blow caused Papyrus to cry out in pain, sending him tumbling over himself onto the ground.

"Ya might wanna start considering it!" I yelled at his crumpled form. _Damn, the shopkeeper wasn't lying about this glove. THAT was satisfying as all hell.  
_

The Mediocre Papyrus shook off the blow, climbing to his feet as if nothing had happened. With a confident glint in his eye, he challenged, "Don't let your confidence get the best of you, Human! Lets see how you handle my fabled 'blue attack!'"

At the sound of his voice, blue pillars of light exploded into existence on every side of me, burning through the dark and snow like fire. It took me the same amount of time to recognize the shapes of the pillars as bones as it did for them to start closing in on me. Which was not very long, let me tell you.

My eyes started scanning the projectiles for some way to avoid them, but my chances seemed stuck somewhere between "impossible" and "hopeless." The bones approached from every single direction and angle, leaving absolutely no room to squeeze through the gaps. Papyrus had me backed into a corner.

 _C'mon, think,_ I urged myself. _There's no way I'm getting captured bye this clown and shipped off to get my soul dissected by some freak-show in the Capital.  
_

"If you see a blue attack, don't move and it won't hurt you," I muttered to myself, recalling Sans' ever questionable words of wisdom within moments of the blue bones of death coming in contact with my skin. The advice sounded sketchy at best and mind-numbingly stupid at worst, but what other option did I have? Try to slip through the cracks and get sliced up like a plate of cheese?

I pulled in my arms and legs and sucked up a heavy breath, staying as perfectly still as possible, as if the storm had finally succeeded in freezing me solid. My every instinct screamed at me to duck under the death-beam that had now taken up my entire field of vision, but I still managed to stay put. Even as it started to pass harmlessly through my body.

Relief swept through me, but I refused to let it out in a sigh, fearing that would be too much movement and the bones would gut me from the inside out. I waited there teeth clenched, wide-eyed, and fighting the will to shiver until the last of the attack passed through me. Aside from the wound on my face Papyrus had inflicted before the fight began, I was unscathed.

 _That's it? Stand still and you come out on top? So much for his "fabled" blue attack..._

I gasped as the air was forced from my lungs in one huge gust. My limbs went limp, and it took all the energy I had left to keep from flopping over like a rag doll. The feeling of cold set in as an icy blue aura curled around my body, but I could still feel myself sweating buckets. I felt completely and utterly drained.

With joints so stiff you could've mistaken me for the Tin Man, I painstakingly raised my head to glance at Papyrus, confusion spreading across my face like wildfire.

"Wh-what the hell did you do to...me?" I sputtered weakly. Practically horrified, I discovered the usually bright red heart sprouting from my chest, my SOUL, had turned a sickly dark blue.

The once pathetic figure I stared down wore a confident smile, readying another bone to his right hand. "You're blue now. That's my attack!" he said simply, without a hint of sympathy in his voice. "NYEH HEH HEH HEH HEH!"

 _Never thought that laugh could ever sound truly threatening._

Before I could attempt to draw in another breath, Papyrus pegged me square in the chest with another bone. My only possible retaliation was to hold my head high, try not to double over in pain, then promptly tumble to the ground like an idiot to avoid getting hit by his next barrage.

I cursed the freezing layer of snow and climbed to my feet as fast as possible, which was way easier said then done. The fatigue Papyrus had set on me made not only my actions, but my thoughts feel stiff and sluggish, as if his spell effectively turned my brain into a ball of week old potato salad. Just as I thought I would easily best the psycho skeleton, he played the ultimate trump card. Only time would tell what other tricks he had up his sleeve.

If I lived that long, of course. Even if Papyrus' attacks didn't kill me, the suffocating cold certainly would.

I stumbled closer to the titan of terrible himself, weaving through his bones as best I could with my handicap. Slogging forward in the ankle-deep powder was hard enough before, but now it felt like I was trekking across a field of butter, in a wedding dress, wearing high heels, with a giant fan blowing against me, while the instrumental rock version of Frere Jacques plays overhead. Thank god for Papyrus' awful aim, or else I'd have no chance to close the distance between us.

"I can almost _taste_ my future popularity!" Papyrus remarked, spinning further away every time I drew near.

"D-dammit...sl-slow down..." I grunted. _Never mind. I still have no chance._

"Imagine Papyrus, head of the royal guard!" he sang to himself, not even bothering to glance at me as he hurled his next wave of bones. They were flying right at me, and there was no time to dodge. I raised my arm in a weak attempt to block the onslaught, but it proved worthless. Two bashed into my forearm, another bruised my stomach, and the last came rolling along the ground, tripping me up. I crashed back down, and any progress I'd made towards Papyrus became null and void. "Papyrus: Unparalleled Spaghettore!"

Climbing up to my feet, I tried my hand at a quip. "P-papyrus: shutting the h-hell up now!" Damn, it was infuriating to hear my voice so sloppy and sluggish. Just separating my lips took so much energy; every word tumbled out carelessly, as if I were some useless beat-down drunkard who'd downed one too many drinks that evening.

He shot me a quick glare, but otherwise ignored the comment. "Undyne will be _really_ proud of me, and the king will trim a hedge in the shape of my smile!" he cheered coldly, throwing - guess what - more bones!

 _Heh. When is he gonna run out and fall apart?_ Apparently, not any time soon. It hadn't taken me long to realize the bones he was using didn't come from his body, but it was still fun to imagine Papyrus trying so desperately hard to capture me he ended up as nothing more than a skull and a hand.

"OW! SHIT!" Speaking of bones and skulls...that one hurt. A lot. A ton, actually. So much so that between that and the other blows I'd suffered, my vision had started to go dark around the edges. If only I had a single shred of monster food...

Wait, the spider cider! That disgusting slop might finally come in handy, assuming it didn't kill me first...

...

... _Dammit, it's in the hoodie. Where the hell did I leave the hoodie!?_

It was no use. I could hardly see a few feet in front of me, and Papyrus and I had been getting lost farther and farther in the storm this whole time. If I was gonna win this, I'd have to be a little more resourceful.

And somehow manage to focus on anything besides the ringing in my ears.

"And my brother will...well, he probably won't change much."

NOW. While he was preoccupied envisioning a future that would never come to exist, I scanned my immediate area for every and any resource that could be of use to me. It was no use. The only thing I could see was the seemingly endless desert of snow stretched out before me...

...Well, it was a horrible plan, but better than rolling over and getting clubbed to death, I guess.

I bent over and, in an obnoxiously slow fashion, snatched up a huge clump of snow in my hand. Just as I raised my arm up, peering around for my target, Papyrus popped up again with another wave of projectiles ready. But this time, I beat him to the punch.

"Farewell, Human!"

 _In the name of the Almighty Stick, please don't miss.  
_

I put every shred, every fiber of strength I had left into hurling the ball of snow at Papyrus. It soared through the air in slow-motion, or at least, it seemed that way, until it finally decided to drop to its target. Thankfully, Papyrus' face acted as the ultimate projectile magnet.

The clump landed directly on his skull, covering his eye sockets and momentarily leaving him blinded. "Nyeh!? What manner of attack is this!?" he cried, scrambling to wipe the crystals off.

"M-my fabled...snow...eh, screw it." I launched a heavy handed punch at his spine, knocking the lanky skeleton off balance. Now with the upper hand, I found myself alternating strikes with my knife and my tough glove, never giving him an opportunity to recover. The opening proved to be the only one I needed. With each blow, I felt myself begin to break free of his curse, as my movements slowly but surely began to return to their normal speed.

I'd say laying my anger into smacking around the migraine-inducing skeleton felt good. I'd say getting revenge on the person chucking bones at me for the last ten minutes in the middle of a snowstorm helped to relieve me of the pain.

But it hadn't.

Whether my knuckles connected with metal or cartilage, they still felt immense recoil, and it came to me as no surprise when I spotted dry red liquid beginning to ooze through the leather glove. My previous injuries never shut up as well, until my whole body was aching like crazy. And...there was something else there, some feeling I couldn't quite place. Regret?

Empathy?

With one last swing, Papyrus was forced to the ground, cowering and writhing beneath me with his arms raised to protect his face.

"I submit, human!" he wailed. "P-papyrus accepts defeat with open arms!"

I blinked, not entirely sure I had heard him. My eyes were fixated on all those cracks that had appeared in his bones. Had they...had they always been there?

 _No, of course not, dumbass. You did this to him._

Not even seconds before, there was all this anger, but now...looking at Papyrus' cowering form, a product of my own handiwork...

 _...What have I done?_

When Papyrus spoke again, his voice was shaky. Nervous. Defeated. Absent of everything that made Papyrus, Papyrus. "My only request is that you make my death swift, and honorable. Worthy of a true Royal Guardsman."

Just as the words fluttered from his mouth, the storm too fluttered to a sudden halt. The world went utterly silent.

...

...

"Cut the theatrics, Papyrus. I'm not gonna kill you," I huffed at last.

He lowered his guard in order to stare up at me. "R-really?" I nodded solemnly. "Oh. Well, that makes our situation much more awkward, then."

That really got me to burst out in laughter. Something about how he pulled a complete one-eighty just grabbed me by the gut and yanked out a chuckle or two. And Papyrus decided to join in as well, whether it was out of relief or...something else. For once, his cackle didn't make me wanna tear my own ears out.

Then the realization of what had happened came creeping back in like a shadow, and my laughter vanished in the blink of an eye. "What the hell are we doing, Papyrus?" I asked, taking a seat besides the "soon-to-be" royal guardsman. Hell, I practically ended up falling on top of him from pure exhaustion alone.

Papyrus' laugh ceased just as quickly. "I...I don't really know, human."

We sat there in silence, never really bothering to address one another for the longest time. The weight of what had happened between us seemed to come crashing down all at once. And it hurt.

That was, until the Mediocre Papyrus noticed me shivering in the cold. Without stopping to think twice, or even once most likely, undid his scarf-cape thing enough to throw it around my shoulders.

Needless to say, I was stunned by the gesture. Almost in shock, to be honest. After all we'd just been through, after the things I said to him, after beating the living shit out of each other, he was still opting to help me!? Either he was downright insane (the more likely of the two options,) or...as cheesy as it sounds, maybe there was a heart hidden somewhere behind that dusty-ass ribcage.

"Paps...I'm sorry."

He turned to me with a puzzled look on his face, and...jeez, was he drawing smiley-faces in the snow!? "About what, Human?"

I shot him a glare of disbelief. "Seriously? You're actually gonna make me explain myself to you?" When he didn't move to say anything else, I sighed and continued. "I'm sorry I said all that shit to you, alright!?" Softer, I added, "Somewhere beneath that...hard, chiseled exterior, there's a not-so terrible person. Dare I say...a _great_ one." _Nice call substituting 'egotistical mess" for 'hard chiseled exterior.' "_ And if that fight was any indication, a pretty damn good Royal Guardsman."

Papyrus lit up. "You think so? Truly?"

I smiled and gestured to myself. "Dude, I'm basically a walking big, ugly bruise right now. I have no clue where the hell you were pulling those bones out from, but they _hurt_."

His over-confidence in himself seemed to come rushing back all at once. "In that case, The Great Papyrus, too, apologizes!" he said triumphantly.

I raised an eyebrow, not totally convinced. Now it was my turn to look like an idiot. "For what?"

"For making you triumph over my awful puzzles, of course!"

 _Oh. Yeah. Those._

I waved off his apology. "Eh, they weren't that bad. Most of 'em, anyways." I paused and thought more about it. The color puzzle, the X and O puzzles, the junior jumble... "Okay, so, maybe the vast majority of them sucked, but-"

"-You can stop now human," Papyrus droned, looking all but amused.

"Y-yeah, good call."

Another silence fell over us, interrupted only by my breaths and Papyrus' teeth chattering non-stop. I was completely convinced beavers made less noise chomping on the bark of a tree than he did. Eventually, Papyrus spoke up again, but he was speaking more to himself than me.

"I can't even stop a child..." he murmured to himself. I quickly prepared a counter-argument, half to cheer him up, and half to defend myself, but he kept talking before I could intervene. "Undyne's going to be _so_ disappointed in me...and I'll never join the Royal Guard..."

 _Shit, that's right. I may have just screwed this guy out of a job._

"And...and my friend quantity will forever remain stagnant."

 _Don't say it._

 _Don't say it._

"Hey, it's not _completely_ stagnant."

 _Just stop right there. YOU'LL REGRET IT-_

"-Ya found me, right?"

 _God dammit, me._

If I thought I'd managed to cheer up Papyrus before, then this attempt blew the last one totally out of the water. He looked happy enough to break out into song and dance right on the spot.

"REALLY?! YOU WANT TO BE FRIENDS WITH ME?!" he squealed, leaping to his feet in the blink of an eye.

"Uh..." What the hell was I supposed to say? _No, sorry, I was just trying to cheer you up, you hopeless loser?_ But, before I could magically screw things up even further, another thought crossed my mind. One I was almost one-hundred-percent certain came from a little flicker of Toriel in the back of my mind.

"Yeah. Sure," I shrugged, like it wasn't at all a big deal. Under normal circumstances, it probably wouldn't be, but everything felt ten times as grand and absurd with The Great Papyrus hanging around.

"Well then!" he cheered, still ecstatic. He cleared his throat. "I mean...I suppose I can make an allowance for you."

I nodded lazily. "Awesome..." For a moment, everything had started to look up. Storm gone, fight over, teeth still in place, all that good stuff. Yep. Things were good. Absolutely nothing in the world that could _possibly_ go wrong at this particular moment in time. Nothing.

Nope.

 _Ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow._

Now that the adrenaline had stopped flowing throughout my body, the eerie blackness had returned along the edges of my vision. Every wound appeared freshly opened, especially the brutal lump on my face.

"H-human? Are you okay?"

 _Where did all this come from,_ I wanted to shout, but couldn't find my voice.

Papyrus' cries and protests sounded quiet and distant, as if he were yelling at me from a mile away. I jammed my eyes shut and threw my hands over my ears, attempting to block everything out. To shut out the pain. But nothing could cut me free of the burning sensation in my body.

I stayed like that for what felt like forever, until exhaustion eventually crept back in and grabbed me by the throat. The last thing I heard before blacking out was Papyrus' garbled shout.

"Don't worry Human, I'll save-"

...

...

"Don't worry. I'll save you."

"I promise."


	17. Chapter 17: Double Order of Burg

_The sounds of footsteps pounding over and over again, like thousands of hammers striking thick sheets of steel with no rhyme or rhythm, assaulted my ears the moment I came to, accompanying the throbbing tremors in my head quite nicely. I shook off my fatigue as best I could and opened my eyes to the cold tile floor spread out below me.  
_

 _"Where the hell am I?" I tried to ask, but no sound came out. Frustrated, I pushed my limp body off the floor and climbed up on wobbly legs. The last thing I remembered was passing out in the snow after my battle with Papyrus, but there was no sign of the lanky skeleton or even a patch of snow anywhere. Instead of the greens and browns of pines trees, I was surrounded by the reds and blues of...lockers, pressed against the walls? Along with...  
_

 _...Unbelievable._

 _People. Humans. A ton of them, all rushing back and forth in every direction like chickens without heads. Most of the albeit very hazy faces I recognized, too, all boys and girls about my age. None I was particularly happy to see again.  
_

 _Once I had finally gotten my head wrapped around the impossibility of the familiarity of my situation, the name of the location finally slapped me across the face._

 _Ebott Center High school.  
_

 _A place filled to the bursting point with insufferable students & teachers alike, horrible staff, and revolting cafeteria food. A place that had time and time again attempted to smoke out and squash any creative freedom I had remarkably maintained from my childhood. A place I oddly hadn't cast a single thought since getting lost in the Underground. Maybe my brain had attempted to shut out anything I hated with a burning passion from my memory as some kind of bizarre survival strategy.  
_

 _It hadn't done a very good job._

Please just get me out this nightmare, _I urged, but it was no use. Regardless of the memories, I had woken up here on the grubby old floor surrounded by chattering dimwits for a reason, and wasn't about to stand around and wait for someone to pass me a note and tell me why.  
_

 _I started down the hall with my hands jammed as tightly in my pockets as physically possible, until I was practically choking them to death, trying my best to block out the surroundings until they faded into the background. It didn't help that this dream was so much clearer, more real than the last. So real that everything almost felt completely ordinary for a moment, myself ignoring the world and the world happily ignoring me back, until another student passed straight through me carelessly, without so much as stopping to scream "GHOST!" It looked as though nobody could see or interact with me at all. If only the average school day were like that.  
_

 _My frustration only grew and blistered as I passed by the same old classrooms on what felt like an endless loop. Why did my subconscious feel the need to have me suffer through this monotonous, tedious, aggravating bullshit in the first place?! I could be catching a refreshing eight-hour sleep right now, but instead I was being forced to wander the crowded hallways of my former torture chamber aimlessly.  
_

 _Eventually, I sighed and threw in the towel, leaning my back against the wall. I wasn't about to subject myself to this shit any longer. If my brain wanted to keep my trapped here, then fine. More power to it. But I wasn't gonna be a part of it. I was gonna wait it out until I could snap myself awake. Simple as that.  
_

 _However, just as I had settled in to my own little corner, watching over my little hallway like a lion, my gaze fell over something strange. On the other side of the hall, just a few rows of lockers down, stood a girl. One mirroring my "I couldn't care less" pose perfectly. One with long hair black as the starless night sky hiding her face. One I was strangely drawn too._

 _One I had recognized almost instantly._

 _I had to do a double-take at first, but I was sure of it. It was the girl from my last dream, the one who had fallen off the windowsill. Well, "fallen" was a bit of a stretch. She had stepped off at her own will, after those horrific vines had...  
_

 _I shuddered, recalling the excruciating details of that nightmare all too clearly. Why had she appeared to haunt my psyche for a second time? Of everyone in this mental reconstruction of my school building, she was the only person I had no memory of prior to falling into the Underground. And yet she kept showing up wherever I went in the dreamscape, mimicking me. Maybe...if I hadn't known her beforehand, my best bet was to try and figure it out while I had the chance._

 _Shaking off my paranoia, I took a few steps towards the girl. When she refused to notice me inching closer, I simply started walking towards her. Even if I couldn't touch or speak to her like everyone else, I could at least get a look at her face. Try and jog my memory a little bit, if nothing else.  
_

 _I froze halfway over to her. Where had everyone gone? A moment ago the hallway was literally flooding with people, but now it was silent and empty. Like a movie theater after the screening of any one of the Jaws sequels. The only person left was...her.  
_

 _"Hey, what's your deal?" I called angrily, forgetting about my minor speech impediment for a moment. Ya know, the one where no sound came out of my mouth. "Why are you stalking me in my sleep?" She once again ignored me, only serving to feed my stubborn rage. "Over here! Hey! Can you hear me or n-"  
_

 _I was cut off as something violently grabbed at my ankle. I whipped around in the blink of an eye, turning to face my attacker with a brave stare.  
_

 _Any confidence I mustered melted when I spotted my attacker._

 _The vines were back._

 _Feeling my heart stop, but thankfully not my brain, I moved to stomp on the prickly tendril with my free leg. The moment I moved to do so, another one shot out and wrapped around it. Yelping, I was yanked to the floor, my chin crashing on the tile with a low_ _thunk. Dazed but not yet down for the count, I thrashed my limbs in every possible direction in a vain attempt to wriggle out of their grasp.  
_

 _More came, seeping out from between the lockers, the doorways, and every crack in the wall until the room had started to look more like a deformed jungle than anything else. Thick thorns dug into my skin, just to add injury to insult. I screamed and clawed at the hell spawns like a wild animal, but it was no use. They had me right where they wanted me.  
_

 _No. No no no no no no no. Not again. I can't go through all that pain again...that torture..._

 _...But they weren't after me._

 _Once I'd gotten my breathing semi-under control, I noticed the remainder of the vines curving away from my helpless form, paying me no mind. At first, I was relieved. Until I realized who they really after._

 _"C'mon lady, RUN!" I tried to shout. But she proved oblivious to the events unfolding around her. To the boy just meters away, trying and failing to warn her of the tendrils closing in around her._

 _I couldn't let it happen to her, too. Whoever she was. I couldn't leave her to the same fate as me. I couldn't._

 _I closed my eyes, and my fingers finally closed around something. Something I knew hadn't been there a moment ago, but I didn't have so much as a millisecond to question it. Griping the hilt of the knife with a burning intensity, I swung my whole body and hacked at the vines curling at my ankles. It sliced through them effortlessly, like chopping through air, and once I was free, the others suffered the same fate. I leapt from vine to vine, severing each one's head until they all lay in one revolting, shriveled pile. Dead._

 _Satisfied, disgusted, and exhausted all at once, I turned back to the girl one last time, just to make sure she had survived the massacre. I didn't have to wonder for long._

 _She stared straight back at me, a look of pure confusion on her face, as if noticing the horrific situation for the first time. I started to say something, but before I could even form the first syllable, she turned and sprinted away without so much as a word of thanks. The last glimpse I caught of her was her jet black hair trailing behind as she bolted around the corner._

 _But the image of her blood-red eyes stayed burned into my mind long after she was gone._

* * *

My eyes fluttered for awhile until I finally rejoined the world of the living. I had expected to wake up cold and buried under a foot of snow, but that couldn't have been farther from the truth. Instead I was warm, comfortable, and had absolutely no idea where the hell I was. _  
_

So two out of three wasn't too bad, right? Right!?

I shot up in my seat, now totally awake and totally trying my best not to lose my shit. I was laying on a fuzzy couch the color of day old-vomit with a warm blanket tossed over me, in what I could only guess was some kind of living room. A rather impressively huge plasma screen TV sat against the wall overlooking the rest of the room, which was otherwise pretty barren. My toy knife, tough glove, snowman piece, and any other piece of my gear that had been recovered lay beside me on a small coffee table.

I allowed myself to calm down a bit after seeing that. If all of my stuff was within spitting distance and I wasn't restricted at all, there was a damn good chance I wasn't being kidnapped, or anything of the sort. But that didn't exactly give me any sort of clue as to where I was, or whatever that... _awful_ smell floating around was coming from. God, it smelled like someone was melting down an old rubber tire in the room next door.

Just as I was getting tired of wondering where I'd woken up, a familiar figure threw open a nearby door and stomped into the room about as noisily as physically possible. Relieved, I realized it was a friendly face. But there was some other feeling hidden there. A weird burning sensation that spread through my chest and stomach like a disease...

"At last, the Human is awake!" he cried, an almost creepily bright smile lighting up his face.

"Good to see you too, Papyrus," I muttered through clenched teeth, deciding I'd ignore the feeling for now. At least I'd been fortunate to wake up moments before Papyrus burst through the door, screaming about spaghetti or something. Would've been one hell of a wake-up call. "I don't suppose you'd like to tell me where the hell I am? Or what that damn stench is, while you're at it."

A brief look of confusion washed over his face, but he quickly shook it off. "Oh, of course you wouldn't remember!" He wasted no time throwing himself onto the couch like a sack of potatoes, nearly sending me hurtling off it. "After you laid down for a nap, The Great Papyrus figured you'd catch a cold, and carried you back to his humble abode!"

Well, at he least he had the decency to skip right to the point. So this was Papyrus' house...

...

...Gotta say, little disappointed by the lacking amount of Papyrus-shaped sculptures.

"Thanks for that. I'd probably be buried under ten feet of ice by now if you hadn't done anything," I admitted. My hand still quivered uneasily, as if it still held the blade from my dream. Yearning for any kind of distraction, I added, "So, uh, you got anything to eat? No idea how long I was out for, but I'm starving."

"Fret not, Human!" Papyrus leaped to his feet, looking about as ready to charge into the front lines as ever. "I took the courtesy of preparing you a piping hot bowl of spaghetti upon your awake! I even took into account what you said about my cooking, and used a special new sauce!"

Oh. Oh no, was _that_ the gut-wrenching smell attacking my nostrils? "Great...thanks Papyrus," I sighed, flopping back onto the couch in defeat.

I only spent another minute or two on the couch after Papyrus went back into the kitchen to finish cooking his disaster. When my heartbeat finally decided to return to an almost normal rate, I threw off the blanket, jammed everything of mine I could find on the coffee table back into my pockets, and stomped off to try Papyrus'..."special sauce..."

I shuddered just thinking about it, but that didn't change the fact my stomach was so desperate for food it'd started to digest itself. Besides, resisting the urge to throw up was just what I needed to force the memories of that stupid dream out of my head. I didn't have the patience to second-guess myself, constantly trying and failing to piece together pieces of an incomplete puzzle. All I wanted was to forget about my life on the surface, the tentacles, and the creepy girl with the blood-red eyes. At least for the time being.

Moments later, I found myself eating with the mighty lord of skeletons himself at his awkwardly tiny dinner table in his somehow even more awkwardly tiny kitchen. My back was practically pushed up against the wall, and the only things occupying any space were a stove, counter, fridge, and an absurdly tall sink that stretched all the way to the ceiling. Certainly wasn't one of the weirdest Papyrus-related things I'd ever seen, but I still had to ask.

"I increased the size of my sink in order to fit more bones under it!" he proudly explained. "Take a looksy!"

"I'm good, trust me," I told him, taking a shaky bite out of the pasta platter in front of me. Incredibly, it didn't taste _too_ terrible. Or rather, it at _least_ wasn't bad enough for me to hurl the plate across the room and rush to the bathroom to puke. The noodles were cooked fine, the only problem was Papyrus' gross "special sauce," which still smelled like burnt rubber, by the way. I would've rather just scarfed down the boring old spaghetti plain.

Plus, no meatballs is an automatic failure for any bowl of pasta.

"Are the flavors exploding against your taste buds yet?" Papyrus asked, leaning his entire right arm along the table as if he were trying to push it over.

I gave him an honest answer. "Oh, they're exploding alright," I sighed. "Honestly Paps, friend to friend, you _really_ need to work on that sauce. Actually, start again from square one. And more meatballs would be appreciated." Noticing his crushed expression, I scrambled to say something good about his dish. Anything good, really. "But the noodles were fine though!"

Papyrus shook off his end of the world stare, offering me a slightly less shocked expression. Slightly. "Truly? But I spent so long working on the perfect sauce recipe..."

I shrugged, not sure what else I could add. "Well, what the hell's in it?"

"Lets see..." Papyrus began counting the ingredients off on his fingers. "Crushed red peppers, sliced tomatoes, freshly chopped garlic..."

"That all sounds pretty fine to m-"

"-And spider legs!"

After getting over the initial shock of hearing that, I quietly pushed away the plate of spaghetti, feeling quite empty inside. "Not hungry anymore."

"But-"

"-I said I'm not hungry anymore!"

A long, uncomfortable silence hung in the air for awhile, long past the point where I got tired of leaning against the table with half my face in my hand. It was in that absence of any and all sound that I realized what that burning in my abdomen was.

Regret. Seeing the happy-go-lucky skeleton back in action, spouting over the top phrases and preparing horrible spaghetti dishes, made me remember all the awful things I'd berated him with before our fight. It was so unfamiliar, like just about everything else down here. I'd said a lot of awful things to a lot of awful people, but never once had I ever regretted letting them know exactly what I thought of them. With Papyrus...something felt different.

"Hey Papyrus?"

"Yes, Human?" Papyrus looked up from doing absolutely nothing, pushing his scarf-cape thing out of his face.

 _God, where do I start?_ "You uh...you sure you wanted to bring me back here? Instead of leaving me in the snow?"

I flinched slightly away. He was staring at me the same way as when I had insulted him, a look of total disbelief. "Of course! Why would I have done anything differently?"

Of course he wouldn't make this any easier. "Because I was a jerk to you," I said simply, as if I were reading off a list of tax returns. "I dunno, seems like it would make more sense to leave me out there. I don't deserve this-"

"-Stop right there, Human." Papyrus cut me off, rising out of his chair with a certain authority he didn't show very often.

"No way! You know I'm right!" I challenged, leaping out of my seat as well. "You might as well be sheltering a wanted criminal!"

"I'm sheltering a FRIEND!"

Papyrus' confidence shut me up instantly. But why would he try so hard to defend me? I should've been like an object to him, a present to give to the Royal Guardsman for a shot at the greatness he desired. Instead, he thought of me as a friend, and I...I didn't know what to think about that.

"Some friend I am," I huffed, dropping back into my seat.

Papyrus sat back down as well, sighing to himself. "I think we may have more in common than you think, Human."

 _Do we? Do we really?_ Maybe Papyrus saw something in me that I was too blind to see for myself. Even though in an entirely different context sharing traits with Papyrus could be taken as an insult, I whispered, "Thanks," back to the skeleton.

"You're very welcome, Human." Then, in a wise tone I didn't think Papyrus had in him, he added, "And thank you for helping me to realize no one person is perfect."

I didn't know what to think of that at first, until I eventually smiled. "You're very welcome, skeleton," I mimicked, and Papyrus returned an even goofier smile.

Now that the pack of elephants in the room had been addressed, and Papyrus and I were operating on more or less the same terms, we were back to sitting around with the putrid smell of rancid spaghetti sauce hanging in the air, attempting to make small talk. Problem was, I still wasn't very good at small talk.

"So...you live here all by yourself, Paps?" I asked.

He seemed delighted that I'd worked up the courage to talk to him again. "Just me and my lazy brother," he nodded. "Although, sometimes it _does_ feel like I'm the only soul inhabiting this household. I swear, my brother wastes more time down at Grillby's than he ever spends around here-"

"-Sup." As if he'd literally been waiting just outside the room dying for someone to page him, Sans barged through the door and meandered over to take the chair besides me.

"Look who finally decided to show up," Papyrus puffed, clearly peeved at his brothers late arrival. "We have a guest you know, Sans. The least you could've done is put a clean shirt on!" He pointed to a massive red stain on the front of Sans' hoodie, no doubt the result of another ketchup incident.

"Sorry, I was a little busy. Had a _bone_ to pick with this one guy down at Grillby's." He turned towards me with that same stupid grin on his face and asked, "So, how's my brother's spaghetti? Edible?"

I smirked at him. "Barely."

"So he's improving."

That was enough to get me to chuckle, and to send a look of disgust washing over Papyrus' face. "That'll be the last time I ever waste my energy feeding you, brother," Papyrus spat, darting over to the stove to further hone his cooking skills and prepare _another_ bowl of spaghetti.

With the Great Papyrus preoccupied, Sans leaned back in his chair and turned to me. "Thanks for bringing my hoodie back, kid. I see you got yourself some new digs."

My fingers went straight to the jacket I'd bought at the Snowdin shop, and only just then did I realize how frigging disgusting I was. It'd been well over two days since I last showered, and frankly, I smelled about as bad as Papyrus' spaghetti sauce. My hair was greasier than some backwater diner out in the middle of nowhere, my clothes were practically laced with dried sweat by this point, and that spider cider I was _still_ carrying around in my back pocket had probably started to mold by now. I'm sure if I found a mirror, I'd see a complete and utter train wreck standing on the other side of it.

"Uh...yeah. I guess you could call it that." Somehow already out of conversation topics, I skipped straight to the point. "So, do you guys have, like, a shower, or...?"

 _Smooth transition there, me._

"A 'shower?'" Papyrus asked inquisitively, which wasn't exactly the best sign.

"Ya know...like a bath?" I pressed. Surely these two didn't seem so disgusting that they never bathed...actually, never mind, that sounded _far_ more likely than the alternative. "For when you start to smell like death, or get a little spaghetti sauce on your bones, or...something?"

"Oh! You mean a wash house!" Paps exclaimed, realization hitting him like a frying pan. "Yes, we have one right outside."

"You have an _outdoor_ shower?"

"If a shower is a wash house, than indeed we do."

"In a town that's almost always below freezing and covered in snow?"

"Most assuredly!"

"WHY?!"

"BECAUSE THE GREAT PAPYRUS KEEPS THE REST OF HIS BONE SUPPLY IN THE INDOOR WASH HOUSE!"

"HAVEN'T YOU PEOPLE EVER HEARD OF A 'CLOSET!?'"

Sans waved his hand, dismissing our argument as if he were swatting a fly. "Relax, kid. You don't smell THAT bad."

"Easy for you to say!" I snapped at him. "Can't recall the last time I saw you without a giant ketchup stain dead-center on your hoodie!"

Clearly my insult was null and void, because Sans didn't seem the least bit phased. Unsurprising by this point, as nothing seemed to work on the insult-resistant wall Sans built around himself, but still equally if not more frustrating than before. "I'm only saying you don't stink half as bad as most of the monsters in town," he grumbled. "I think you'll survive, kid."

I resisted the urge to scream something back at him and decided to drop the argument altogether. "Fair enough. That's the most I can damn well hope for down here."

That little comment shut the two of them up for awhile. Tired of listening to the strangely aggravating sound of water boiling on a hot stove, I stood up from my chair. I'd spent a long enough time at the skeleton household, and god knows how much time I spent asleep on their couch. Now that I had officially made amends with Papyrus, I didn't have much left on my agenda to do around here. "Thanks again for letting me sleep here, guys, but I think it's about time I get back on the road," I announced, and without waiting for a response, headed out towards what I presumed was the exit.

"W-wait, Human!" Papyrus called after me, sputtering like a madman. "Weren't you going to at least stay long enough to try my next batch of spaghetti?!"

I sent a half-smile and a lazy wave over my shoulder. "Maybe some other time, Paps."

"Then at least give us some way to contact you!" he suggested, ignoring the bubbling water overflowing the pot and pouring onto the stove.

 _With what,_ I asked myself, but the answer came to me almost immediately. "I have a cellphone," I offered, pulling out the ancient piece of technology Tori had given me so, so long ago in the Ruins. I had almost completely forgotten about it up until that moment, and was glad to see it finally coming in handy. I had basically been carrying it around as added baggage until now.

"Perfect!" cheered Papyrus, and moments later, we exchanged numbers. While the idea of giving Papyrus the option to call me whenever he wanted was more than a little worrying, it was easily much better than the alternative, never being able to get in contact with him for the rest of my life.

Once Papyrus had called _twice_ just to make sure the number worked properly, I was able to leave without any more hassle. I stepped out of the door and onto the front steps, recognizing the house for the first time on my way out. It was the last one on the very edge of town, right next to the stretch of land where I'd fought Papyrus in that blizzard. It would have seemed small if I hadn't already known only two people were living there.

I stood still for a moment, not enthralled at the idea of being back outside in the cold, until I heard the door creak open behind me.

"Hey, kid. Wait up."

I turned back to the doorway to see my second favorite skeleton leaning against the frame. "What's up, Sans? If your brother sent you to try and convince me to stay, don't worry about it."

Sans shook his skull. "Nah, I was just gonna ask if you wanted to head down to Grillby's for a bite to eat."

My immediate reaction was to violently shoot back with, _Why the hell would I ever want to suffer through the misfortune of eating at that disgusting, rundown piece of shit "diner," if you could even call it that?_ But I bit my tongue and said, "Didn't you like...just come back from eating there?" Of course, logic never applied to any situation with Sans in it anyways, but I couldn't help but try.

"I'm always hungry," he mumbled with a shrug. "And I know for a _fact_ you are too. Don't lie, you had, like, two bites of my brother's spaghetti at most."

Couldn't exactly deny that. But that didn't mean I couldn't deny the rumbling in my stomach. "Nah, I'm seriously not hungry. Besides, I don't think I'd wanna eat at Grillby's anyway..."

I swear a literal spark of light crackled in Sans' eye. "Well, in that case, now we _have_ to go," he urged, closing the door behind him and walking closer to me.

 _Dammit._ "I told you I'm not hungry!"

"And I told _you_ we have to go to Grillby's." Seeing the snarl carve its way across my face, he added, "Trust me, you'll love the burgers there. By the way, you can cut it out with the 'I'm not hungry' crap, I can hear your stomach rumbling from over here."

 _Double dammit._ Although I had to admit, a real, juicy burger with a side of fries sounded like heaven right about now. It wasn't like it was out of my way, either, just a few places down the street even. Maybe I could order one to go...

"...Alright. You win. I'll come."

" You mean I finally _grilled_ you into coming?"

"...Shut up."

Sans snickered to himself, then reached out and grabbed me by the wrist, dragging me around to the other side of his house.

"The hell are you going? Grillby's is down that way!"

"Trust me, I know a good shortcut," he promised, with a little extra wink serving only to further confuse me. Before I even had time to question his incredibly vague and...honestly pretty shitty logic, he pulled me into the thick wall of evergreen trees that lay bordering the town.

For a split second, everything went pitch black. I almost cried out, fearing Sans had somehow dragged me straight off a cliff, but the feeling was so brief it was like waking up from an especially vivid dream.

Right in front of Grillby's.

I stood on the front steps of the shady restaurant, looking just as shabby and uninviting as before, staring as Sans as he casually pulled open the front door. Noticing my bewildered expression, his smile deepened. In an almost insultingly casual tone, he said, "Fast shortcut, huh?"

I didn't buy it. Not for a second. "Sans, how in the hell did you-"

"-HEY SANS!"

"-Hiya, Sansy~"

"Weren't you just here for breakfast a few minutes ago?"

My question floated away uselessly in the bombardment of greetings Sans received the moment he entered the "establishment." I would have pressed further, if Sans hadn't reached behind him and dragged my mind-fucked self inside, slamming the door shut behind me.

"Nah, I haven't had breakfast in at least half an hour," Sans continued, blissfully ignoring my death-glare. "You must be thinking of brunch."

The entire room erupted in laughter, slaughtering any chances of me actually managing to get my bearings. Luckily it was followed by total silence, which gave me just enough time to become acquainted with my surroundings...

 _...Uh-oh._

Grillby's appeared equally as decayed and shabby on the inside as it did on the outside, featuring countless cracks in the hardwood floor and brick walls, chipped paint on the tables and counter, holes in the would-be cushiony seats, playing cards scattered across the floor almost as commonly as the multiple drink stains, and pretty much anything else to ward off unsuspecting teenage males from entering and staying long enough for a bite to eat. Unsurprisingly, it wasn't very crowded, but why _anyone_ would want to eat here at all, yes, even _Sans_ of all people, alluded me.

But that wasn't why I was uh-oh-ing. Every face in the dimly-lit diner was trained on me, and none of them looked too happy to see me. Strike that, they looked ready to leap any second and start tearing me limb from limb, _especially_ that terrifying one in the booth whose entire face was pretty much one gaping mouth, big enough to swallow me whole. It was possible every single monster in here had immediately recognized me for a human, or they just didn't weren't interested in any new faces taking up space in their favorite hangout.

Either way, _uh-oh_.

I tried to say something witty and clever in the vague hope of convincing them I wasn't worth their time, but my heart felt like it was trying to clog my throat. Instead, my whole body tensed up, and I was left standing there uselessly, choked up for one of the first times I could remember, waiting in vain for Sans to at least _attempt_ to convince them not to kill me. But, of course, he was still oblivious to the silent death-threats being thrown at me, and moseyed on over to take his seat at the counter without giving me a second thought.

"H-Hey creeps-I mean, guys!..." I finally coughed up, ready to bolt out the door at the first sign of hostility. Turns out, calling an audience ready to kill you "creeps" didn't make them any more affectionate.

" _Bark Bark!"_

I spun around to face the familiar earth-shattering bark, like music to my ears. Without even needing to see him, I knew the sound came from the huge lug of a dog I had "befriended" before I had reached Snowdin. Sure enough, sitting behind a poker table, wagging his massive tail like a propeller, was the over-excited mutt, who came bounding over to me the instant his gaze meant mine, knocking the table out of his way to do so.

"Whoa! Easy, boy!" I pleaded with the minuscule amount of air I had left after he rammed into my gut with the force of a dump truck. It didn't help that he was still dressed in full body armor, for whatever reason. After a mixture of scratching behind his ears and wrestling him off like a bull, I finally forced him away long enough to get a glimpse of the rest of the room. Every monster had returned to their own buisness, gorging themselves on the food, drinking themselves under the table, or literally flopping face-down _on_ the table, freshly given up on life. A couple more dogs I knew were working to replace the poker table, both Doggo and that weird doggy couple, whatever their names were, only to have it knocked over again by the enormous dog's stampede to return to its seat.

"See, you fit in perfectly here!" Sans goaded from across the room. He'd taken a counter seat, and was eagerly patting the seat next to him for me to sit down.

Any sense of nervousness or confusion had eroded, and my suspicion of Sans flooded back in. No way had he gotten us here that quickly, shortcut or no. As I'd always thought in the back of my mind, he was hiding someone behind that cocky grin of his. You could even see it the tiny white pupils ducking in his eye sockets. Whatever "it" was.

"Don't push it," I warned, moving to take the seat beside him. Right at the last conceivable moment, I noticed the small, inconspicuous whoopee cushion taken up my spot. "Dude, it's never going to work on me!" I plucked the Baby's First Pranking Device off the chair and waved it around in his face.

Instead of flinching away, or giving me any sort of satisfying reaction, Sans calmly grabbed the whoopee cushion out of my hand and stuffed in it his back pocket. "One of these days, kid." He patted the seat beside him again. "Now get comfy."

I scoffed at him, hopping up onto the (admittedly pretty comfy) stool without any more delay. After a lot of consideration, I bit down the mind-numbing urge to press Sans for answers I knew he wouldn't have for me. Nothing could penetrate the impervious wall he'd built around himself to deflect any and all questions thrown at him. Somehow, not asking at all was less frustrating than being dealt hollow answers.

"So when do we order?" I asked, inching away from a passed out drunkard laying just a few seats down.

Sans pointed over the counter, seeming pretty excited out of nowhere. At first, I thought he was gesturing to the rows and rows of bottles stacked on the shelves. Until I noticed a figure moving towards us, and my "ready to bolt if you look at me funny" mentality returned, twice as convincing as before.

Needless to say, the bartender was on fire.

"Need a lighter, Grillby?" Sans jested as the figure loomed over us, almost forcing me to avert my eyes. I would have, too, if they weren't torn wide open in shock. "Grillby's" head was nothing more than a tall, intimidating orange ball of flame with a set of glasses thrown over the place where the eyes should have been. He strode up with an indescribable amount of confidence and, well, _heat_ radiating off him, draped in a collared shirt  & tie and bright orange gloves to match the fire on his head. His hands were working absentmindedly to polish a glass cup with a cloth. I only noticed because I had to wonder how his hands actually appeared under the gloves.

"Kid?" Sans snapped me back to reality. "You gonna order sometime today?"

I pulled my eyes away from Grillby, which was easier said than done. I could've sworn from the position of his glasses he was staring right through me, burning me to a crisp from the inside out. If not for the fact he was on fire, I would've called him stone-faced.

"Uh...y-yeah," I finally squeaked. Stopping to clear my throat, I said with a little more confidence, "You guys have burgers?"

For one gut-wrenching second, Grillby said absolutely nothing, or made any move to suggest he heard me. I gulped, fearing I'd somehow already managed to piss him off, until he slowly nodded.

"C-cool! Can I...get one? With cheese? Oh, and no spiders!" Another nod. Maybe Grillby couldn't speak without fire squirting from his mouth like vomit. Or my dashing good looks had left him utterly speechless.

"That sounds good," Sans agreed. How he managed to speak calmly around someone as terrifying as Grillby boggled my mind. "We'll have a double order of burg, Grillby. Don't worry about the ketchup."

Just like that, Grillby disappeared behind a door in the back of the restaurant, probably to go grill us some grub with his face.

"Well _he_ seems nice," I complained bitterly to Sans, extra careful to make sure Grillby didn't overhear from the other room. "Dude could use a hairnet..."

Sans lifted an eye socket (still not sure how that worked.) "Who? Grillby? Guy's a total sweetheart."

"Why do I get the feeling I can't trust anything that comes out of your mouth?"

"'Cause you'd be right."

 _Great, thanks for making that crystal clear._

I rapped my fingers against the table for the next two and a half minutes, waiting as patiently as possible for my burger to come out. Sans didn't bother saying anything either, just shifted back and forth in his seat, as if he were waiting for something. Using my astute deductive reasoning skills, I came to the conclusion he was _also_ waiting for his food. Incredible, I know.

"So..." the randomly somber skeleton spoke up.

"You ready to explain that whole 'shortcut' incident?" I offered.

Sans rolled his eyes. "Already did, kid," he countered.

 _Damn, he's good._

"What do you think of my brother?"

Well that came out of left field. "Whaddya mean?" _I swear, if he's trying to set us up on a blind date..._

"Like...you think he's 'cool,' right?"

 _Alright Sans, what the hell are you up to?_ "I mean...no?" I sat up in my seat, worrying Sans might misinterpret my answer. "Uh, not like that! He's a 'cool' guy, I guess, but he's not, like, 'suave' or whatever. He's definitely one of, like, _five_ people I've ever met that I don't feel like strangling."

"Yeah, I see what you're saying," he said after contemplating my answer. "So, am I one of those five people?"

I smirked at him. "Sometimes."

"That's what I thought."

A moment later and Grillby strode up to us carrying plates barely big enough to hold the burgers set atop them in each hand. My eyes lit up (pun _very_ intended) when he set them down in front of us, nodded, and left us to our food.

"Hope ya didn't under-cook these Grillby," Sans teased, pulling out a...full bottle of ketchup from his jacket and setting it on the counter. I'd say I was surprised, but...what else would I have expected? "It feels like we just ordered."

"Speak for yourself!" I couldn't remember the last time I was this hungry. Finally, _real food_! I'd pretty much been stuffing myself with exclusively junk or other sugar-bombs for the past two days (even Tori's pie wasn't excluded.) Not to mention the food in question was mankind's - and apparently monster-kind's - finest creation, a grilled, juicy patty charred to perfection topped with streaks of melted cheese flowing like rivers of gold, slapped between a pair of buns to hold the masterpiece together. And sesame seeds were kinda cool, too. "Lets frigging eat!"

Before I could snatch up and devour my burger whole, Sans felt the need to shove his precious bottle of ketchup in my face, causing my stomach to howl in anger. "Sure you don't want any ketchup-"

I shoved his hand away. "Keep your crappy tomato paste to yourself, Sansy, I'm busy!" Sinking my teeth into the burger, I knew then and there I wouldn't be disappointed.

"More for me," Sans muttered, slurping down the entire ketchup bottle in one breath.

I probably would've commented on how disgusting that was if I hadn't been so absorbed in enjoying my burger. Whether or not it was the best hamburger I'd ever had was up for grabs, but saying it was "satisfying" was a huge understatement. If I ever made it back - no, _when_ I made it back to the surface, I'd have to try grilling more burgers with my face, 'cause Grillby cooked it more evenly than the number two thousand, two hundred and twenty-two. "So good..." I moaned in between bites.

"Tasty, right?" Sans inquired. I hardly heard him, and a moment later had already forgotten to answer. The worst thing I could possibly say about the ball of condensed happiness is that it was gone far too quickly. For such a huge burger, it went down pretty easy. It left me fulfilled, but somehow still wanting more.

"Biggest understatement in the history of everything," I said at last, resisting the urge to lick my fingers for any remnants of cheese scattered on them. "Thanks for dragging me here, Sans." _Even though I'm still not exactly sure how you did it..._

"No problem, kid. I love talking time off of work."

The two of us sat there for a little while longer, until Grillby came to take our plates away. Mine was practically licked clean, aside from a couple crumbs stuck in globs of cheese, but Sans' still had well over half a burger sitting on top of it. I guessed downing a whole bottle of ketchup filled you up pretty fast.

"Anyway, cool or not, you have to agree Papyrus tries real hard," Sans spoke up, wiping ketchup stains around his mouth on his sleeve.

I sighed. Why did Sans suddenly feel the need to drill it into my skull how awesome Papyrus was? Did he still not believe that we were all buddy-buddy now?

"Like how he keeps trying to be part of the Royal Guard." I allowed him to keep chewing my ear off, as a thank-you for taking me out to eat, if nothing else. "One day, he went to the house of the head of the Royal Guard and begged her to let him be in it."

"Certainly sounds like Papyrus," I chimed in.

"Of course, she shut the door on him because it was midnight."

"Also sounds like Papyrus..."

Sans shot me a glare. "BUT, the next day, she woke up and saw him still waiting there."

 _Whoa._ I raised an eyebrow. "She shot him down, and he still sat there all night waiting for her?" I inquired.

"Yep, that's exactly what I just said."

 _Right._

"Seeing his dedication, she decided to give him warrior training." He hesitated for a second. "It's, uh, still a work in progress."

"Shocker." As much as I made fun of him, Papyrus' determination was something to marvel at, even if he had absolutely no competence to back it up. Who knew, maybe he'd find his calling someday. Sans surely seemed to think so. "You're right though, there's more to that goofball than meets the eye."

The next few words that fell out of Sans' pun-loving mouth held a lot more weight than either of us realized at first. "I think that's true of anybody, really. If you dig deep enough."

"Maybe so."

I spent the next few minutes watching the group of dogs play poker, betting on bones instead of cash or gold. It was mildly entertaining, in all likelihood because every time some puppy won the rest would bark angrily, and I got to imagine all the swears I couldn't understand flying out of their mouths. For some reason, the huge dog, the only one not smart enough to speak, won way more pots than any of the others. Not all of us could be poker wizards, I suppose. For his massive size, and his godlike poker skills, I officially dubbed him "Greater Dog."

"Hey kid," Sans tapped me on the shoulder.

I spun back around to look at him. "What's up?"

Apparently, something really important. Sans had shifted closer to me, and was even going so far as to lean down closer to the counter. In a hushed voice, he asked, "If you're not sick of listening to me run my mouth, I wanna ask you something."

I brought my head lower. "Go ahead. Shoot," I whispered. God, why did it feel like the spotlight was beaming down on us all of a sudden?

Sans paused a moment before speaking again, checking around us to make sure nobody else was in earshot. "Have you ever heard of a talking flower?"

My heart nearly stopped, and I hated myself for that. There was no way...was he referring to Flowey? I hadn't ever run into any other talking flower since the Ruins, but then again, Snowdin _was_ a snowy wasteland. I suppose anything was possible in the Underground, but...

...I couldn't help but get my hopes up. If Sans knew something, _anything_ about that scum, that abomination, that waste of life, I had to know about it. I had to.

"Yeah. I have."

"So you know about it," Sans murmured.

 _Finally, some answers..._

"The _echo_ flower."

...Dammit! I felt my heart sink back into its original spot. I was so close! I thought for sure Sans had a lead on Flowey...

...Then why the need for all the secrecy?

"They're all over the marsh," Sans continued. "Say something to them, and they'll repeat it over and over..."

I frowned. After having my hopes slashed in two, the rest of Sans' story didn't interest me much. "Okay, so what about it?"

Sans perked up a little bit. "Well, Papyrus told me something interesting the other day."

"I'm listening."

"Sometimes, when no one else is around..." God, Sans, spit it out already! Unless, something about this story was actually troubling him. "A flower appears and whispers things to him."

 _Welp. There goes my heart again, from zero to sixty just like that._ I felt my eyes widen, too. Maybe I'd jumped to conclusions a little bit too quickly. _Whatever, lets hear the rest of the story._

"Flattery...advice...encouragement..."

"...Predictions." Then, as if nothing about what he just said bothered him, as if he could just take something so huge with a grain of salt, he added, "Weird, huh?"

 _Get yourself under control._ But I couldn't. Flowey had nearly killed me. Flowey had left me to die. Just the possibility he might be stalking Papyrus was gut-wrenching. I swore right then and there, if he ever laid one single "friendliness pellet" on that skeleton...

"Someone using an echo flower to play a trick on him," Sans interrupted my thoughts. Appropriate, seeing as how he hadn't technically stopped talking to me, but annoying all the same. He stared me dead in the eye. "Keep an _eye_ out, okay?"

Part of me was dying to tell him it was no echo flower manipulating Papyrus. Until I realized I could be dead-wrong. Why would a bastard like Flowey waste his time talking up Papyrus? It almost seemed more likely the alternative was true, and Sans was right about someone using an echo flower. After all, Paps didn't have the best reputation around Snowdin. Or at least, so I'd heard.

Yeah...yeah, there's no way it was Flowey. It just didn't add up. He was probably off somewhere torturing dandelions rather than annoying a harmless skeleton. No point in torturing Sans by lying to him and saying there was a psycho murderer after his brother.

Either that, or it was some messed up sense of pride that forced me to withhold the possible truth from Sans. If Flowey was somehow involved, I had to be the one to settle the score with him. I had to. "Don't worry. I'll make sure Paps doesn't get himself into any trouble," I promised. At least I could offer that.

Sans seemed like a massive weight was taken off of his shoulder. "Thanks."

Just like that, Sans heaved a sigh and hopped out of his chair, seemingly forgetting about the conversation we just held. "Welp, I think I've let you keep me away from work long enough."

"But you're the one who brought me here-"

"-Grillby! Put me and my buddy's burgers on my tab!" He turned to me one last time before he walked out the door. "By the way, I was going to say something, but I forgot." And with that inspiring tidbit, Sans left the restaurant, leaving me to wonder if I made the right choice not to tell him about Flowey.

 _Of course you didn't,_ I told myself. _When do you ever make the 'right choice?'_

I thought about that for a second. _Oh come on, even jack-offs like me wind up choosing right occasionally. Even by accident.  
_

 _..._

 _...Especially by accident._


	18. Chapter 18: Entrance to Waterfall

I left Grillby's not long after Sans, when the stench of alcohol alone was enough to leave me feeling scattered and woozy. Before I skipped town, I made sure to ask one of the monsters which direction would get me out of Snowdin the quickest.

"Following that there river with the chunks of ice floatin' in it downstream will getcha' to Waterfall," answered a horse with bright green hair slicked back between his ears, rocking a thick pair of shades even though there was no sunlight to block. "If you're lookin' to get to the Capital, then that's the way to go, kid. And make sure when ya get there to tell 'em we don't need any more city slickers round' here. It's crowded damn well enough as it is!"

 _...City slickers? What would that make you guys, snowball lickers?_ "Thanks, I'll be sure to let them know," I agreed to his request, more or less to get him off my back. As I left, I heard him toss around another idea behind my back.

"On the otha' hand, I'd _love_ to see some city slickers slip on their butts!"

Setting off on the edge of town, I spotted a huge chunk of ice bobbing up and down in the water and moved to follow it. But not before I stopped to cast one last glance at the skeleton household, wondering if Papyrus had finally perfected his spaghetti sauce recipe. And another thought deeper in the back of my mind: if I would ever see it's colorful array of lights again, the warm glow that resonated within nearly every building in town. For possibly the last time, I bid an icy fair well to Snowdin.

The "skies" were much more clear in the stretch where I had fought Papyrus, without a single speck of snow floating around in the air. I pressed forward until the trees started to disappear, the calm sound of rushing water grew just loud enough to echo around me, my feet met with solid ground instead of the squishy uncertainty of snow, and a thick rocky roof began to stretch overhead. Things started to get a lot more claustrophobic pretty quickly, although I honestly couldn't have cared less. As long as I didn't have to drag my feet through three hundred inches of snow anymore, I was happy.

...Maybe not "happy," more like "mildly content," but as long as I never had to see, touch, or hear about another snowball for the rest of my life, I was mildly content.

"Starting to see why they call this place Waterfall..." I muttered to myself, noting the river flowing beside me again and the many, many clear streams of water falling from cracks in the stone ceiling. While the muffled cold of Snowdin still fluttered around like a flurry of moths, the cave I found myself in felt moist and damp. The air was heavy, and every wall was glistening with the same shine as grass in the morning dew. I was almost reminded of the narrow caverns of the Ruins, except this area felt much less developed. More natural. With a subsequently much more "natural" and uneven floor that I was prone to trip over constantly. I told myself I'd just need to adjust to treading on something like this, although it didn't help much to keep my temper under control.

The cave finally opened up a little bit, just when I was getting so heated I could've lit the place on fire. I squeezed through the gap into the wide open chamber, where something immediately caught my eye. Another sentry post sat on the other end of the room, identical to the others strewn about Snowdin. Only difference was the pudgy-face comedian sprawled across the counter top as if he couldn't be bothered to hold himself up, guzzling down a bottle of ketchup like a complete cow.

Somehow, I'd already run into Sans again, after seeing him maybe ten minutes ago at Grillby's. I resisted the urge to gag at Sans' serious drinking problem and began making my way over to the skeleton, if for no other reason than he was already on the path forward.

"Yo! Are you sneaking out to see her, too?"

 _Dammit, why do I have to recognize that ear-rupturing voice?_ I groaned, turning towards the shrill cry reluctantly. Sure enough, it belonged to that monster kid with the spikes running down his head, the very same one who sounded and twitched like he was on a constant sugar-high. The one who, worst of all, had no arms, so I'd have to be completely conscious of every single insult I threw at him, which was never any fun. Maybe it was best for my sanity to try and hold a normal conversation for once.

"To see who?" I asked, genuinely clueless.

The kid narrowed his disturbingly huge, piercing eyes at me accusatorily, as if I hadn't gone out of my way specifically _not_ to make fun of him. "Aw c'mon, don't play dumb! You know who!"

I crossed my arms. _Lets see how he reacts to being torn off his high horse_. "Listen kid, do you honestly think I have any reason to prolong a conversation with _you_ by acting like an idiot?"

He shuffled back and forth on his feet, looking more dense than the rocks surrounding us. "Huh?"

"Exactly. So lets have it, who are you talking about?"

At first, the monster said nothing, taking his sweet time to process my last sentence. Eventually, he snickered. "Heh, not bad, _other_ kid!"

"Spill it!" I demanded.

"Alright, alright, fine!" he agreed. "I came out here to see Undyne!"

"The captain of the Royal Guard?"

Now it was his turn to give me the "are you freaking kidding me?" stare. "No, Undyne the baker. Of _course_ the captain of the Royal Guard!"

I gulped internally. So, Undyne was patrolling Waterfall. Probably snooping around, tracking down any signs of humanity like it was her job or something. Now I was glad the monster kid had decided to call out to me; otherwise I might have stumbled right into her clutches, completely unaware she was even in the area. If the rumors I'd heard floating around Snowdin were true, she wouldn't be a total push-over. Might be best to keep to the shadows for now, at least until I knew if she really kicked ass or not.

"Man, she's the coolest..." murmured Monster Kid, not even looking my way anymore.

"Gee, I couldn't tell by the way you won't shut up about her," I interjected, nearly reaching over to flick him in the snout. "Any idea what I should watch out for? Just to know when I've found her, of course," I added quickly.

He spun back to me, literally looking as red as a tomato. I didn't need to know what was flashing through his thoughts. "So you _were_ sneaking out to see her?" he asked smugly.

 _Damn, not bad, kid._ "Okay, ya got me. How can I find her?"

"Easy! She'll be in a big suit of armor on patrol, so you can hear her footsteps when she's nearby," he explained, adding in a few stomps to really drive his point home.

 _Suit of armor, huh? This toy knife might not make the cut anymore, but hopefully the tough glove pulls through..._

"I'm gonna go look for her up ahead!" squealed Monster Kid, rushing past me and out of the room. But not before tripping over his own feet, and with no arms to catch himself, he landed face down on the ground with a loud, echoing _SLAP_ following soon after..

I actually flinched, solely from how painful that looked. "Yeesh. You okay, kid?"

Thankfully, he hopped up without even letting the injury slow him down. "Yep, I'm fine! Happens all the time! Oh, and don't tell my parents I'm here!" Then he disappeared deeper into Waterfall.

God, talking to that kid was exhausting! Every word that rocketed out of his mouth felt like it was being shot out of a cannon at breakneck speeds. He had given me some sound advice, though, so maybe running into him again wouldn't be the worst thing in the world.

"Yo! Are you sneaking out to see her, too?"

 _...Huh? Sheesh, I didn't mean right this second!  
_

"To see who?"

"Aw c'mon, don't play dumb! You know who!"

My face pinched. What the hell was going on? I hadn't become so infatuated with Monster Kid that my mind felt the need to replay the conversation we _just_ had, had I?

"Listen kid..."

No, it was definitely coming from outside my head. My eyes darted around the room looking for the source of the sound, but the only two people left were Sans and I, and he was still deep-throating his bottle of ketchup. In fact, the only other thing in this room besides the sentry station was that weird flower...

...Wait, that flower! A tall flower painted with the same light blue color as the ocean - or at least what I had seen of it in pictures - wearing six wrinkled petals like a necklace. The sight for sore eyes rumbled a little bit in time with the voices fluttering through the room. I started to make my way over to it, and with every step, the familiar voices grew louder.

"Kid, I literally _just_ got done teaching you about echo flowers, and you're still gonna stand there looking all mystified?"

I did my best to block out the passing conversation (ever listen to your own voice on a recording? It sounds pretty out-there.) and nodded to the skeleton. "You stalking me or something, funny guy?" I accused him playfully. "Feels like I'm starting to see you everywhere."

Sans shrugged. "I could say the same thing to you, kid." He gestured to his mess of a work station like it was as glorious as the Taj Mahal. "This is just another one of my humble sentry outposts."

"You're a sentry for Waterfall, too? Thought you hated work."

"Yep, and two jobs means twice as many legally-required breaks."

I couldn't help but roll my eyes. "Of course. How stupid of me not to think of that sooner." Clearing my throat, I asked, "So, if you see Undyne, you'll ring me up to warn me, right?"

Sans rapped his fingers on the table, as if debating whether or not to take me up on my request. "I dunno...what's in it for me?"

"...Seriously?"

"I'm just screwing with ya, kid." Placing his hand over his chest, he promised, "I'll call if I see or hear anything... _fishy._ "

I frowned. "Was that a pun?"

"Maybe."

"Never mind," I sighed. Leaving Sans to his "work," I set off in the direction Monster Kid had scrambled towards, catching the first few words Sans and I had shared echoing behind my shoulder.

The next room greeted me with a massive, you guessed it, _waterfall_ that spilled across the path forward. I started to look for a way around it, since getting wet with the dauntingly cold air hanging overhead would freeze me like a human ice cube, but it was no use. There was no wall on the right side of the cave, I noticed, and nothing but an inky black abyss waited below, where the water vanished without a trace. Curious, I kicked a small pebble over the edge sand dropped to my hands and knees, listening for a splash.

It never came.

"Dammit. How did Monster Kid get through here?" I wondered aloud, rising back to my feet. Unless there was some secret passage hidden around here, the only way forward was through the gushing water. The other side was easily visible from here, so it wasn't too far across...

I tested the water with my shoe. Surprisingly, the force of the water couldn't even begin to move it anymore than I could move the cave wall by ramming my face against it. Didn't feel too deep, either.

Reluctantly, I dropped into the flow of water, which to my dismay rose up just over my crotch. As I had expected, the freezing temperatures nipped at my legs and...other features like mosquitoes, probably making the hairs stand up at a ninety-degree angle, but it beat the agony of standing around, twiddling my thumbs. So I began wading across the path, face permanently pinched in a look of pure, undiluted discomfort.

"Great idea again, me," I chastised myself. "Don't backtrack five feet and ask the shortcut wizard if he knows another way across." My ramblings were briefly interrupted by a violent shiver erupting in my body. "N-no, let's do the _sensible_ thing and jump into the below-freezing waterfall and wade through it. Sh-sheer brilliance."

I was about halfway to the other side when I heard a loud splash behind me. I glanced backwards to find the source of the noise, surprised to see a hunk of rock slowly being pushed down the waterfall, eventually toppling over the edge. Another splash rang out to my side, followed by another. And another.

I turned my gaze upwards and went wide-eyed. "Oh...oh, SHIT!"

While the speed of the water hadn't been enough to knock me off balance, the boulders tumbling down from above certainly would be. I ducked backwards to avoid being hammered, only to have a few more splash behind me, each bigger than my entire head. Had they not been there a few moments ago when I was entering the water, or was I actually just that oblivious?

 _Who cares?! Just go!_

I began hobbling forward at mach-speed, lifting my legs as far out of the water as possible. It proved more difficult than I had expected; the rapids had gained a surge of speed, now tugging at my ankles like the icy cold hands of the un-dead. The rocks began falling faster, leaving splashes in the water that sounded more like explosions that blocked out every other sound. Veering away from the falls lessened my chance of being crushed, but made it likely that one of the swept up rocks would knock me off the cliff side. Neither option sounded very promising.

Vaulting over another stone, I aligned myself to be far enough away from the falls so I wouldn't be pelted with water and rocks alike, but not so close to the drop-off so I could avoid being pushed over the edge. I hoped.

 _C'mon, only a little bit further..._

I was no more than a body length away from solid ground when a particularly fast boulder charged from just outside the corner of my vision and rammed into my side. I grunted as the wind was ripped from my lungs, and my legs came out from under me. Before I could so much as scream, my whole body was shoved underwater.

My better judgment was clouded and replaced with a primal urge to survive. I found myself thrashing about in the water, gasping for breaths that wouldn't come, banging my knuckles and elbows on the rock that was steadily forcing me over the edge, until I was sure the water was stained red. A river of blood and earthy tomb miles underground was appearing to be my resting place. I couldn't think, couldn't fight, couldn't struggle anymore, until a single, calming presence overshadowed every other feeling. It spoke a single word.

 _Breathe._

Talking its advice, I focused on pushing my head above water and took in one, long, deep breath that I didn't have time to hold in. But it worked to clear my thoughts, to better grasp my current situation. I finally grabbed hold of the slippery attacker practically dangling me over the edge, and wriggled out of its grasp. With my legs hanging out in mid-air, I climbed up against the current, rolling out of the way of one, final rock. Chilled to the bone, exhausted, and barely able to hold in a breath, I seized my opportunity to escape. Although I had no memory of how I'd gotten there, I found myself back on my feet, mere inches away from safety.

I dove for it. I landed hard on dry land, gasping and sputtering like a flounder out of water, but I had made it.

"Next time, I'm asking Sans for another damn shortcut," I muttered bitterly, making no move to get back on my feet for a good while. Eventually, the way my knuckles were scratched up and bleeding, and my thoroughly soaked clothes urged me to get up and keep moving. I needed to find a bit of monster food to patch myself up. Unfortunately, I hadn't thought to take any with me heading out of Snowdin, even though I certainly had the pockets for it...

 _...Crap, my pockets._

First I fished out my phone, which somehow still turned on fine despite being completely submerged in water. Second, I pulled out the snowman piece I had promised to keep with me. The jar was cracked open like a skull, obviously, but only a small piece of the glass had been knocked out of place. Most if not all of the snow remained, and only a little water had seeped in, so it remained in more or less good condition.

"...I'm here with my daily report..."

I lifted my head at the familiar voice, almost a whisper, and stuffed the jar back into my now heavy pockets. This time, I listened more closely to distinguish it from the hushed waterfall.

"Uhh...regarding that human I called you about..."

 _Papyrus._ What the hell was _he_ doing here? Shouldn't he be back in Snowdin, setting his house on fire in another attempt to cook a decent bowl of spaghetti? It took me a second, but I spotted the lanky skeleton, or at least the top half of him, above me on a higher section of Waterfall, surrounded by thick stalagmites jutting upwards like man-made columns.

"Huh? Did I fight them?" asked Papyrus carefully, as if trying not to step on any toes.

My lips had just begun to form the words, "Paps, who are you talking too?" but I quickly silenced them. Another figure stood beside Papyrus, one I hadn't noticed, I concluded, because they blended into the dimly lit cavern so perfectly.

A knight, seemingly larger than anything on the planet despite standing just barely taller than Papyrus, clung to the darkness cast by the cave like a spider to its web. Their armor was nearly as black as the space around it, chiseled like a statue with steel-tipped-boots and a huge helmet carved into a toothy grin rivaling that of a jack-o-lantern. Like Grillby, they radiated a sense of strength and superiority in the way they proudly held up their shoulders, although theirs felt much more...hostile. She could be ready to leap into the heat of battle at any moment.

Little bit intimidating, if you could believe it.

"Y-yes! Of course I did!" Papyrus had tried to sound triumphant, but in the presence of this knight, he couldn't help but sound withered and defeated. "I fought them valiantly!"

As Papyrus started to brag to his superior, I decided to take the opportunity and stay out of sight for now. I ducked into a thicket of tall grass that clearly hadn't gotten much water, feeling dry as the crusty desert earth. They cracked and rustled under my feet every time I shifted, a dead giveaway if the pair stopped talking, but it was too late to jump out now. I had fully committed to my incredibly crappy hiding spot.

"W-What?" the skeleton knight choked. "Did I capture them...?"

I bit my lip, resisting the startling urge to defend my bony friend. What good could I do for him down here, anyway, besides shifting his companion's attention to me instead and screwing us both over? It was best just to stay hidden for now.

"Well...no."

At that point, the knight spun towards its underling and stomped angrily on the ground, creating a pounding sensation so loud it put Papyrus' normal shouts and cries to shame. I noticed a bright red feather jutting out of the back of its helmet whipping around as its head turned to stare at Papyrus, the only discolored part of its outfit. My heart leapt into my throat, and didn't make any move of settling back down.

"I tried very hard, Undyne, but in the end...I failed."

 _So that's Undyne._ That towering hunk of metal was the head of the Royal Guard, possibly my biggest threat to getting out of here alive. It made sense that someone as menacing as her would fit the role of leader pretty well, and the thought of fighting her one-on-one, mano-y-mano...lets just say I wasn't thrilled at the idea. Anymore than I would be hurling myself off another cliff.

 _Well, you know what they say: the bigger they are, they harder they fall. Just like my other favorite saying: the more combat training your opponent has, the more likely they are to drill you a new asshole._

"W-what?" Papyrus cried. "You're going to take the human's soul yourself?"

Had Undyne said anything else? Even when she was pissed off, she still managed to conceal her voice so well I couldn't hear her. Oh, and the whole "going to take the human's soul yourself" part was pretty hard to glance over, too.

After that, I had expected Papyrus to back down in defeat, figuring nothing he said could sway his commander's decision. Instead, he continued to surprise me. "But Undyne, you don't h-have to destroy them! You see..."

It was no use. In his efforts to defend me, Papyrus was immediately shot down. I saw Undyne shoot him a stare deadlier than any weapon either of them could pull out, and he started to stumble backwards. Another minute disguised as an hour past with me standing by the sidelines, watching with my eyes bulging out of my head. Eventually Papyrus sighed and spoke again.

"...I understand," he chattered solemnly, hiding his mouth beneath his scarf-cape thing.

 _NO, no you do NOT understand,_ I thought.

"I'll help you in any way I can."

 _NO, no you will NOT help her in any way you can!_ I bit back the urge the scream at the skeleton who'd virtually agreed to sell me out on the spot. _Please be lying to save your own skin, Paps. I definitely don't need any more enemies down here._

 _...Shit, he doesn't have any skin, does he?_

Without another word, Paps ran off back in the direction of Snowdin. I waited "patiently" for Undyne to move on for her patrol as well, only made harder by irritating cuts on my knuckles, elbows, and...knees, I realized. My skin looked like it had a nasty run-in with the pavement after a bad mess-up on one of my free-running outings. The stinging pain was nothing I was unfamiliar with, but that didn't mean I was glad to have it around. I glanced again at Undyne's shadowy form, which hadn't moved an inch since Papyrus left. What, had she fallen asleep on duty or something?

"...Screw it, I'm going for it," I whispered to the blades of grass encompassing me, moving out of the bush and back on the way forward. But the damn bush was so noisy...every move that I made I couldn't help was being broadcasted to the entire world.

 _Almost there, just a couple more steps..._

 _CRRRAAAAAAACK!_

Without warning, the loudest tree limb ever snapped beneath my foot. For a split second, I acted naive enough to hope Undyne magically hadn't heard the nuclear explosion I'd set off. But the very next split second, Undyne jerked to life, wasting no time to start marching towards me.

My heart stopped, but time seemed to be flowing in double speed. Thankfully, the hamster wheel powering my brain hadn't rusted all the way through. _Dammit, do I bolt or try to disappear in the bush?_ Fighting was out of the question, I barely had a chance of even _denting_ that armor, but at the same time it might weigh her down enough for me to slip away. Or she might charge me down like a frigging elephant and drown me in the waterfall before I could even realize, "Whoops, I got myself killed! "Maybe next time, jackass!"

 _What if she hasn't seen me yet?_ If that were the case, I'd probably be better off staying put, hiding behind my shield of flimsy pieces of grass. But if she had seen me...

...So hard to think when you're concentrating on how sweaty your palms are...

...If she had seen me, it was game over either way. I dropped back further into the bush until there was hardly any trace of me left. Peering through the frond, I spotted Undyne looming over the top of the wall, not even ten feet away, her glowing yellow pupils trained directly on me from underneath her haunting helmet. I felt something grip my internal organs as she outstretched her hand, and with a few crackle and sparks of light, materialized a glimmering blue spear with a tip seeming sharp enough to cut through steel.

 _Well that looks like fun._

Without a single sound besides the clanking of her armor, the captain of the Royal Guard reared back, ready to throw her spear at a moments noticed.

I was doomed. I should've ran. I was such an idiot. But now it was too late. Why did I let me convince myself to stay put? All I could do now was stay perfectly still, eyes wide open in fear with sweat and water dripping down my face like rivers of tears.

Undyne looked to the left, then turned her gaze to the right...

...

...I let out a silent breath of relief. She was still searching for the source of the sound, of any movement in the bush, but found none. Huffing, Undyne banished the spear in her hand and vanished without a trace. I waited in total silence until the sounds of her footsteps disappeared, and allowed myself to calm down.

"Holy shit..." was all I could muster after that encounter. First the damn rocks had almost killed me, and now this. What would I do if I ran into her again? _Fight,_ I guessed, unless I had a clear means of escape in the best-case-scenario. Until then, I had to deal with the crushing feeling of dread looming over me and continue forward into Waterfall. _Eh, nothing I'm not used too anyway..._

As I stepped out of the thicket, now HEAVING sighs in a vain attempt to soothe my nerves, another rustle followed me in the grass. I whipped around, fearing Undyne had somehow snuck up behind me, only to see the little Monster Kid stumbling out of the bush behind me.

"When the hell did you get here?!" I squeaked, unable to sound anything but terrified for the time being.

The kid seemed oblivious to me, wearing the biggest smile I think I'd ever seen on _anyone_ up until that point. "Yo, did you see the way she was staring at you?!" he cheered, literally hopping up and down with glee.

 _Like she wanted me dead? Might've missed that part, whoops._

"That...was...AWESOME!"

"No, seriously, how and when did you get in that bush?" I insisted.

"I'm SOOOO jealous!" the kid continued his rant.

"The. Bush. Right there. How did you get there?" _Am I slow talking out of frustration to a little kid? God, I'm old._

Monster Kid finally mustered up the decency to pay me some attention. "That's what I'm saying, dude! I was there the whole time!"

I blinked. Had I seriously missed the little bugger sitting right next to me the entire time I was cowering — I mean, _strategically hiding_ — from big, bad Undyne? Either this kid was a master of stealth, or I was a master of stupidity. Probably both.

"What'd _you_ do to get her attention...?" he trailed off, ending his stream of rambles with a nervous chuckle.

 _That's right, he doesn't know I'm human._ "Heck if I know," I muttered. "I was just minding my own business, eavesdropping on important conversations, the usual."

Monster kid uttered another chuckle. "Same." Glancing over his shoulder as if he were expecting a third figure to jump out of the thicket, he added, "You hear that part about a _human_ hanging around here? Crazy stuff, right?"

I hesitated a moment, then nodded. "Terrifying."

"B-but hey! I'm sure Undyne will catch it! Why don't we go watch her beat it up!" he suggested, rushing past me without waiting for an answer. Not before tripping, face-planting, scrapping himself off the floor, and turning around to assure me be was okay. Again. "C'mon! Let's go!"

"You keep falling hard like that, and your face will stick to the pavement for good." I waved him off. "Go on ahead, I'll catch up."

Monster Kid paused mid-step. "O-okay!" he said at last, before scampering off. Just like that, I was alone again.

...Something about the way he had said "it" was gnawing at me. As if I were some dumb, stray animal being hunted down. As if me making it this far was just some string of dumb luck, as if I were dealt a perfect hand. The kid didn't even know it, and he might as well be spitting in my eye.

 _Exactly. He didn't even know it, and it should stay that way. Let it go._

Alright, back on track, I was about to see if I could find my way out of Waterfall without drowning in anymore waterfalls...


	19. Chapter 19: Wishes

**When four Bridge Seeds align in the water, they will sprout.**

 _That's too bad,_ I thought, _I was getting super excited to hop back in the water again._

Ignoring the god-awful chafing courtesy of my drenched clothes and taking the sign's advice, I plucked up one of the bridge seeds and tossed it in the river obscuring my way forward, watching as it floated to the other side. Three more seeds later and the plants bloomed into a tightly woven series of bright pink flowers hovering over lily pads. I shifted my weight onto the first flower to test if it would hold me, and was relieved to see it hardly crippled under me at all. Flowers in the underground must be genetically engineered to be badass or something, these ones in particular feeling strong as bungee cords rather than the fragile petals of a flower. I crossed the gap with no problems.

Just as I was beginning to notice the cave walls growing slightly darker and darker as I went deeper in, a faint blue glow began to illuminate the dusty cavern. I nearly trampled over the source of the light, a pair of blue mushrooms that shared the same color as the echo flower from before. But these were translucent, looking more like a pair of jellyfish than mushrooms, emanating that same glow that filled the empty spaces around me. There were a whole bunch of them growing out of the cracked floor like weeds.

"Better than yanking up dandelions..." I muttered, grabbing at another bridge seed. The path was blocked, as usual, by another body of water, which meant I had some more beginner's basic bridge building to do. About halfway through my endeavors, something incredible happened. My cell phone actually _rang_. After all this time sitting around wasting space, it finally had a purpose. I carefully pulled it out of my pocket while balancing the bridge seed in the other hand, immediately recognizing Papyrus' number flashing across the embarrassingly tiny screen. I found myself hesitant to answer at first after overhearing Papyrus' one-sided conversation with Undyne. (One-sided for Undyne, I mean. Even though Paps was the one talking, he wasn't in control of that dialogue.) Was he calling to warn me of the danger, or trying to sell me out to his superiors?

Eventually, I forced myself to hit the answer button and set the phone on speaker so I could continue my work. "What's up, Paps?"

"Hello! This is - oh, you already know." His voice came out distorted and messy over the phone's crappy speaker, but I was still able to make out what he was saying. Barely. "So...what are you wearing...?"

A visible frown crossed my face, even though I knew he couldn't see it. "Look Papyrus, I'm not playing dumb for you. I saw you talking to Un-"

"SHHH-SH-SHHHHH." Papyrus' attempt to shush me sounded so malformed by the speaker it threatened to make my ears bleed. "Please, tell me," he whispered slowly. "What are you wearing?"

This time, I could practically hear him winking at me through the phone. _He's still on my side_. A grin erupted onto my face like a volcano. "Oh, nothing out of the ordinary," I continued, doing my best to hide the sarcasm in my voice for once. For all I knew, Undyne could be lumbering over the skeleton, listening in on every word. "Just an...old, dusty tutu..." _Okay, maybe something a little more believable than that._ "...Sandals, a T-shirt, and I've got my baseball cap on backwards. As usual."

Silence on the other end. Then, "Got it! Thanks, friend!" The phone clicked, and the call was dropped. Just in time for me to complete my bridge of flower and head across.

Papyrus' dedication to throw off Undyne, his superior who frankly wouldn't hesitate to kick his skinny ass into next week for disobeying her, amazed me. Would've creeped me out a bit too, if we were talking about any other person in the universe. Undyne could've thrown in an extra million gold on top of a spot on the Royal Guard and endless admiration, and Papyrus undoubtedly would give it up to help me. He was a friend. Wish I could've said something like that for anyone back on the surface. Or even myself.

"Stop right there, human!"

 _Oh great, another wannabe Phantom of the Opera._

The challenging cry belonged to, what else, another monster with biology so confusing scientists would tear their own hair out trying to figure why nature was so...horrifically kind to it? Some parts of the beast were too surgically perfect, and other parts seemed slapped together like an eight year old's science project. Needless to say it was...difficult to describe.

Best place to start was the head, I guess, shaped like a horse's with a...for lack of a better word "glorious" mane flowing in the nonexistent breeze, glued to a body sporting pecs bigger than my head and more abs than I could count. Nothing too crazy, aside from the fact this jacked-as-hell guy didn't stand on any legs, but the tail of a mermaid.

...No, seriously, it was just sitting on top of its folded fish tail like a gross, scaly, albeit colorful chair, cycling through flexing poses like a body builder trying to impress women, because nothing in that brain of his would ever be enough on its own. If the monsters I encountered kept scaling up their weirdness at this rate, I'd be fighting flying sharks with turtle shells and laser cannons for eyes before long.

"You realize I could literally just take a leisurely stroll and still outrun you, right, Fish-Legs?" I asked. "Now, if flexing could help you run a marathon, then you'd be business."

The heroic smirk worn on its face deteriorated faster than my ability to care. "Oh."

"Nice biceps, though." Just like that, I left the bastard child of a body-building horse and...merman contemplating it's purpose to exist.

I found myself in the dimmest room yet, so dark I could barely make out my own hand in front of my face. Without those radioactive mushrooms lighting the way, I worried I would have to feel my way along the wall to avoiding tripping into anymore puddles of water. Or monsters, for that matter. Thankfully, the way forward was marked by a series of sparkling blue crystals, maybe sapphires, embedded in the roof of the cave. They twinkled like a discount set of stars.

"...A long time ago, monsters would whisper their wishes to the stars in the sky."

The voice came so monotonous and distant I doubted it had ever existed in the first place, and I was simply losing my mind in the dark corners of Waterfall. But moments later, I heard it again, each syllable ringing like a meticulous note from a music box, closer this time. "If you hoped with all your heart, your wish would come true."

 _Sounds like the lazy introduction to a half-assed fairy tale, but where the hell is it coming from?_

With my arms outstretched in front of me, I eventually bumped into the speaker. At first, a burst of anxiety clasped around my heart, until I realized my fingers were sliding over the smooth surface of a flower petal. An echo flower, to be exact.

"Now, all we have are these sparkling stones on the ceiling..." The voice trailed off like the end of a song, until the recording reset itself moments later.

 _Making wishes under the stars?_ Been there, done that, and hadn't since I was about five. The idea of wishing your problems away had seemed childish, let alone pointless, to me for almost as long as I could remember. As if there were some magic force thousands of miles above the sky willing and ready to solve your problems for you at the snap of their fingers. As if were that easy. You had to have fallen to a serious level of desperation or just plain stupidity to stoop to that level, a point even I hadn't hit yet, especially since finding that snowman had reignited my desire to escape Ebott. Granted, if I'd been stuck living underground for the last however many hundred years, I probably would've hit absolute rock-bottom, too.

Pushing past the flower, I continued feeling my way through the cave, until another voice battered its way into my head. "Thousands of people wishing together can't be wrong. The king will prove that."

 _Thousands?!_ God, had every frigging spirit in the Underground been chewed up and spit out? The monsters I had come across hadn't exactly seemed cheery for the most part, but had they really all bought into this wishing bullcrap? Where was Papyrus when ya needed him...

Two more voices infiltrated my ears. "C'mon sis. Make a wish."

"I wish my sister and I will see the real stars someday..."

Now they almost had _me_ believing it was a bit more than a myth. Either that or the passerby were kids using the wishing propaganda to help keep themselves dreaming. To keep the weight of the world, in this case the tons and tons of rocks and stone hanging above them everyday like and eerie mist, from crushing them. Kind of a downer when you stop to think about it.

One last echo flower stood in the corner of the room. "Ah...seems my horoscope is the same as last week."

 _Welp, good thing I can always count on random Underground happenings to lift me out of a shitty mood._

I turned a corner, sidling between two walls a little too close for comfort, until the rock opened up into a somewhat less claustrophobic room, letting out a forced breath of relief. I thanked the fake stars Waterfall wasn't as tightly knit as I'd expected. Being sandwiched between two sharp, damp, and massive stone walls didn't feel all too comforting. Even though I knew it was an irrational waste of thought, I couldn't help but envision the walls caving in, trapping me for all eternity. Sort of conflicted with my current plans. Just a bit.

The squeaks and groans of rotting woods sounded from beneath my feet, and I realized I wasn't on the cave floor anymore. An old boardwalk stretched out over a reservoir of water that had collected below me, gradually flowing away in different directions. If there was one thing consistent about Waterfall, it was the presence of water, whether it was visible in rivers or clinging to the walls, audible by the light, trickling echo as it spilled against the walls of the cavern, or just flat-out trying to kill me. It was an awkward shift from being constantly surrounded by the more obvious nature of snow, but at least Waterfall had retained Snowdin's numbing cold, enough to make me want to tear my own skin off. You know.

In case I got _too_ comfortable. Better to keep alert and on my toes at all times, right?

 _...So cold..._

I took a few hasty steps forward, my trust for the shoddily nailed-together boardwalk waning, but something stopped me. After a sudden turn right, the path forward laid parallel to a series of plaques jutting out of the wall. Forgetting my uncertainty for the planks of wood, I curiously approached the first plaque in the line. Once I drew close, I no longer had any doubts about what it was. It was nearly identical to the plaque in the Ruins, right down to the thin layer of dust coating it like the moisture coating the walls of the cavern. "Only the fearless may proceed. Brave ones, foolish ones, both walk not the middle road," I recited, dragging my hand along the surface of the tablet to clear it. Sure enough, like a wound from a knife, markings were carved into the marble, and words bled out from behind them.

"The War of Humans and Monsters." I said it aloud, because the meaning excited me too much to keep it in my head. Finally! This was the kind of stuff I'd been searching for in the Snowdin Library, at Toriel's house even. Not a single one of those history books touched more on the war that cast the monsters into the Underground, aside from, "There was a war. The end." Unable to contain myself, I moved to the next plaque and began to read aloud:

 **Why did the humans attack? Indeed, it seemed that they had nothing to fear. Humans are unbelievably strong. It would take the SOUL of nearly every monster just to equal the power of one human SOUL.**

The text ran dry, and I scurried over to the next plaque to continue reading. A flicker in the back of my mind urged me to slow down, but I cast it aside.

 **But humans have one weakness. Ironically, it is the strength of their SOUL. Its power allows it to persist outside the human body, even after death.**

I wanted to stop and process the weight of what I had just read, but it was no use. The wounds were bleeding so profusely now they began to flow together in one huge blur. **  
**

 **If a monster defeats a human, they can take their SOUL. A monster with a human SOUL...A horrible beast with unfathomable power.  
**

 **A horrific monster, a festering wound, something beyond life itself, is scratched into the last plaque. Humans plant themselves around the crumpled, yet familiar, beast, thrusting their primitive spears into them again and again. Soon it's writhing on the ground in pain, but the humans are without mercy. They don't stop until the beast's pathetic breaths halt, its body lay shriveled and withered like an empty husk, and it, like the cold winter night, falls silent. The room is spinning, the rivers are running a warm, sticky red. That same sickening liquid is pouring down my face. Laughter echoes off the walls...**

 _...It's mine?_

I violently snapped back to reality, as if waking up from a nightmare. The liquid running down my face was nothing but a rush of sweat. The plaques were no longer bleeding. The river was plain old water again. But I was still laughing coldly. Out of fear.

Finally, the absurdity of my outburst hit me, and my lips slammed shut. My sarcastic edge was completely lost. _What the hell is wrong with me? Am I going god-damn insane? I guess anything's possible, considering I'm surrounded by lunatics twenty-four-seven now..._

I reached down and grabbed the front of my jacket to dry the sweat off my face, but it was still soaked through, and didn't end up helping much. My pained gasps got caught up in the fabric, and I ended up choking on my own breath. _That felt way too much like one of my dreams...maybe I_ am _crazy...or having Undyne stalking me is psyching me out...  
_

"Oh, god." I let the words tumble out in a heavy sigh. All of a sudden, I had no idea _what_ to think. The existence of souls was true enough, evidenced by the red heart that still refused to leave my chest, but persisting after you die? Monsters _absorbing_ human souls? Even compared to everything else, it sounded unbelievable. And maybe it was nothing more than superstition; after all, the text never gave an example of the event. Besides, if a war was fought between the two groups, even if it was started by humans, they _had_ to have taken at least one human life. Surely there would be a clearer depiction of the souls being absorbed, and the transformation itself, if it had really happened. Did that make any sense? Was _I_ making any sense?

And that...vision. Nothing like that had ever come over me before. The gruesome imagery, how real it all felt...and why was I seeing it now? The text hardly went into any detail about the bloodshed, and somehow, it was all I had ended up seeing...

...and I could've sworn I had seen it somewhere before...

 _Forget it._ It was all too overwhelming. The ancient text, my seemingly random dip into insanity...and all I wanted to do now was be alone, away from the haunting words of the plaques, away from the crude illustration of a monster with the power of a human soul. If that even made any sense.

 _Okay. Okay. On three, I'll move on. Back to my old self. Ready?_

 _One._

 _Two._

 _Three._

I took a deep breath, curved my lips into their usual permanent scowl that may not be so permanent anymore, and started off down the boardwalk again. I quickly transitioned back into complaining internally about how rickety and rotten it was, because somehow that helped to shut the grim reality of everything out of my mind.

After walking for a few minutes, the cave began to grow dark again. Shadows extended over the water like storm clouds over an open ocean, turning the water a murky black. Eventually it became so gloomy that everything aside from what was immediately in front of me seemed to disappear. It didn't take very long for loneliness and boredom to creep back in, which formed a path that lead back to my deeper thoughts, which was not something I wanted to return to. Not after my...incident from earlier.

Luckily, I didn't have to stay that way for very long.

I barely had enough time to see the spear hurtling down at me from above, let alone avoid it. But I had caught sight of it at the top of my vision moments before it struck me square in the head, and managed to back-step just in time. The glowing projectile collided with the boardwalk, sending shards of splintered wood splashing into the river below, and scraping against my skin. I threw up my arms to block the pellets from my face, and in that time the spear blinked out of existence without a trace.

"Look, lady, this _really_ isn't a good time!" I yelled, although the adrenaline rushing to my head admittedly felt pretty good after recent events. Wish it didn't have to involve me almost dying, but what're ya gonna do?

Once the wood chips had settled, I spun around to find my attacker, no doubt Undyne. Papyrus had tried, but clearly a fake outfit change wasn't enough to keep the Royal Guardsman from hunting me down. At first, I couldn't find her, until I noticed her sinister glare poking out from the shaded columns across the river, with the rest of her bleak armor becoming apparent afterwards. The platform she stood on ran parallel to the dock, but the two didn't come close enough for me to reach her. As she readied another wave of spears behind her, I realize grimly that I was completely at her mercy.

"Right, I forgot you don't care. My bad." With no way to cover my escape, I took off sprinting farther down the boardwalk, hoping I could leave Undyne in the dust. It was right about then that I remembered why I had decided to stay hidden in the bush when she had spotted me, and my suspicions were confirmed.

Undyne sprinted like a god damn tiger.

The knight had no problem keeping up with my pace, even with the burden of concentrating her aim on me. All I had to focus on was running and dodging, but that proved much more difficult that I had anticipated. In addition to being built thin, the boardwalk would randomly twist & turn and change directions on a dime, as if the monster constructing it couldn't make heads or tails of where it started and where it was supposed to end. I had hardly any room to move, the cave was black as coal, and the spears were flying at me from behind, meaning I had to rely on the sound of them whizzing through the air more than anything else to know what was coming.

To put it in layman's terms, I was totally and utterly fucked.

At least Undyne's aim wasn't great, which was probably why she ended up throwing three or four spears at a time. However, with every spear that missed me or that I ducked or darted out of the way of, it felt like they only started to come faster and faster. What it basically boiled down too was an archer taking a few shots at a target, missing all of them, reloading, rinse and repeat, until he gets so fed up he throws away the bow, pulls out a chain gun, and starts unloading all hell on the target. Lemme tell you: not very fun being the target in that scenario.

One spear passed just by my ear, another threaded the needle between my legs, and a third practically lodged itself in my shoulder blade before abruptly vanishing. The pain stun like acid, but I didn't let the wound slow me down. Every time the boardwalk decided to throw me for a loop and turn with no reason whatsoever, I gauged whether or not I could clear the gap before the walkway returned to its normal position. Nine out of ten times I jumped regardless of what conclusion I came too. My feet scraped the top of the water as I climbed back onto the wood on more than one occasion, but I never once fell in.

 _C'mon, c'mon, I need a way to break free from this psycho...would be a lot easier if it weren't darker than a supply closet in a blackout...there!_ The boardwalk was coming to an end up ahead, back in a more enclosed section of the cave where the floor wasn't buried under water. Seeing my ticket out, I cranked it up into my highest gear. The spears had began to sail uselessly past me and over my head, indicating that I had finally begun to leave Undyne in the dust. Another few seconds and the spears stopped coming all together.

"Later...loser!" I yelled behind me. Thinking of decent insults felt next to impossible when you were dedicating one-hundred percent of your energy to not dying. 'Course, it was still a little too soon to be celebrating.

Especially when I heard the sound of metal slamming against wood directly behind me.

 _Shit, she jumped over. She jumped over. She jumped over. And she's catching up. She's catching up. SHE'S CATCHING UP!_

Sounded more like a stampede of rhinos were chasing me rather than just one monster, but that would've been too much to hope for. At least a pack of rhinos would be so heavy they'd fall through the boardwalk. My heart and brain were pounding like pendulums in perfect unison. _Where do I go!?_

The answer came to me as last-second as possible. More accurately, the answer didn't come to me, I ran head-first into the answer.

A mass of bushes, the same thin, dry ones I had used to hide from Undyne earlier, spread out before me from wall to wall. If I managed to stay hidden from her once, maybe I could pull off that same trick again?

 _Well, it's either that or be trampled like a gerbil on a highway, so let's take the bushes._

Forcing myself to slow down against every instinct begging me to keep running, I ducked into the thicket and did my best to disappear. Time wasn't exactly on my side, Undyne was only a few moments behind me. I quietly shuffled through the leaves, trying to shift as close to the wall as possible, until my personal stalker marched into the field of bushes without slowing down.

I froze, sucking in one last breath to hold in order to stay as silent and still as possible. _There's no way she can see me,_ I dared to think, but Undyne wasted no time flattening the thick shrubs underneath her heavy armor. I waited for a few seconds, until it became clear she was searching for me aimlessly. _Home free...  
_

A flicker of movement appeared a few steps to my left. I had no idea what could have caused it, but at that point, it didn't matter. Undyne snapped her attention to it instantly.

 _Great. Might as well have lost at roulette three hundred times in a row._

I cursed my luck and sank even deeper into the brush, but Sir Lance-a-lot stood almost directly above me now, so close I could hear her muffled breaths from the inside of her helmet. Fearing the worst, which seemed pretty appropriate by this point, I slipped on my tough glove for a last-ditch effort to defend myself. _Alright you glorified tin can, bring it,_ I challenged, if only to hide from the thought of being impaled and delivered to the king of monsters like a trophy.

Undyne pulled back her armored hand, reached down into the thicket, and grabbed...

...

...something, but it wasn't me.

Instead, she held up none other than her biggest fan, Monster Kid, by the top of his face. Even though it looked like she was crushing his skull, he was smiling wildly, almost shaking in her grasp from excitement. Until she dropped him, that is, and stomped off back the way we had come from in defeat.

At that moment, I had no idea whether I should worship Monster Kid for saving me or blow him off the face of the Earth for nearly getting me killed. When I was absolutely sure Undyne was gone, I slipped out of the brush on the other side, and the little fanboy popped out behind me.

"Yo...did you see that!?" he asked, dancing around like a drunk college student at a particularly shitty party.

 _Yeah, I saw you almost get me killed...or make her give up?_

"Undyne just TOUCHED ME! I'm never washing my face ever again!"

I scoffed at him, turning so that he wouldn't be able to see the gash across my back. "Have fun with the acne problems, then," I warned.

Despite my insult, Monster Kid continued to beam at me. "Aw, you're just jealous you weren't standing where I was!"

"Yep. Super jealous," I nodded.

"Yo, don't worry! I'm sure we'll see her again!" he assured me, which was pretty much the exact _opposite_ of what I wanted to hear. Something along the lines of, "Don't worry, dude, she doesn't patrol this part of Waterfall!" would've been much more appreciated.

Without waiting for a response, he ran off up ahead again, but not before his obligatory face-smearing trip onto the cave floor.

I gave him a couple minutes' head start before following him deeper into Waterfall, hoping that would be the last time I'd see Undyne.

 _Yeah. Wouldn't that be funny?_


	20. Chapter 20: Blue Dreams

If you had ever asked me if, at any point in my life prior to falling into the Underground, I would imagine myself locked in heated combat against a bathtub with a face, I probably would've responded with a well thought out, "Huh?" But there I was, dodging forceful blasts of water from a monster shaped like a tub, complete with a rubber ducky sitting pretty in the center, who only attacked me because I refused a "bath" (which was either a kind invitation to wash me 'cause I smelled like shit, or a creepy sexual advance. Either way, I was just starting to dry off after my little dip from earlier, and wasn't looking forward to getting soaked any time soon.)

I ducked under a jet stream fired by the creature, but found myself losing my footing, stumbling carelessly into the nearest wall.

 _Sloppy._

Irritated, I pushed off the rocky surface, leaped over another water blast and over the tub itself, and brought my gloved hand down hard enough to crack the glass holding the monster's water supply. Noticing it's defenses crumbling, the Little Bathtub that Couldn't wobbled off shrieking at the top of his lungs, even though I was positive I hadn't hurt him. Along with water, a few gold coins trickled out behind him as he ran, which I didn't hesitate to pick up. He had attacked me, after all, and only because I had stated I didn't want to get wet. Just normal Underground stuff in a nutshell.

 _Actually, just normal stuff in general. Most rapists wouldn't take no for an answer if they ask you to get wet with them..._

"Nice moves there, Kid," came a familiar, relaxed voice. "No wonder you've been getting along so well without my help."

 _Nice moves? I was fighting like I had three left feet!_

I threw on a smirk and trotted over to Sans, who leaned carelessly against what looked to be a sleek silver telescope. Why he bothered with a telescope in a muggy, claustrophobic cave, I had no idea. Maybe to get a really detailed close up of paint drying. "Your 'help?' Even Papyrus is putting in more work than you, dude. Not that it's helping much, but at least he's _trying_." I explained the whole outfit-swap trick Papyrus and I had played on Undyne.

Sans nodded, grinning so hard his teeth threatened to shatter. "So, my bro's looking out for ya too, huh? Nice to see him a little more...grounded, than usual."

I ran my fingers through my hair, relieved to feel the thin strands were finally dry. "Heh. He does sound a little less...tunnel visioned, I guess? He's actually focusing on something other than himself, is what I'm trying to say."

"Hmmmm..." Sans hummed. "Sounds a bit familiar, huh Kid?"

 _Watch it, Sans._ "Yeah, yeah..."

All of a sudden, Sans perked up like a dog offered box of treats. "Perked up" by his standards, anyway. "Speaking of tunnel vision, howzabout a little look through my premium telescoped?" he offered, patting the side of the glorified magnifying glass carelessly. "Normally I'd charge you fifty thousand gold to use it...but since I know you, you can use it for free."

"Premium, _and_ free, huh?" I whistled. "In that case, I might just have to take you up on that offer."

I conveniently left out the part of my explanation where I, admittedly, wasn't looking forward to exploring any more of Waterfall alone after my encounter with Undyne. I was willing to delay that inevitability, wasting as much time as possible with another living being - in this case Sans. Hell, I had been *this* close to reaching out and stopping Monster Kid when he ran off earlier, just so I had a companion to travel with, but the words had caught in my throat. The feeling left a sour taste in my mouth on both sides of the coin: fear of being caught by those sinister, sharp eyes cutting through the blackness of Waterfall like searchlights, and from the sudden necessity to cling to others for protection. After narrowly escaping Undyne with a fair share of wounds, and after experiencing first-hand that...gruesome vision...how did I know if I could trust my own mind and body any longer?

"Kid? You working on your world famous horse impression or something?"

I blinked away the annoyingly vivid images of my limp body impaled on a sea of spears, noticing Sans had slid out of the way, allowing me some elbow room with his telescope. I hadn't realized my eyes had been shut at all, as if I were asleep. Must've reminded Sans of how horses slept standing straight up, or something like that.

Pretty shitty joke regardless.

After he brought me back to reality, I swallowed the urge to invite Sans to travel with me, for...reasons. Maybe it was that same messed up sense of pride I couldn't climb over, but I convinced myself the skeleton would probably just make up some half-assed excuse on the spot to get out of it, anyways. That had to be it. "Whatever you wanna call it, dry bones," I said, leaning down to peer through the lens of the telescope.

I wasn't really sure what I was supposed to be looking for to begin with, and after a second, I noticed the only thing I could make out was a solid red circle no matter where I angled the lens. Some kind of sticky substance, almost like batter, clung to the space around my eye. I no longer wondered why Sans had brought his telescope here of all places. I had literally walked head first into one of the most obvious pranks of all time. _Paint on the damn lens._

"Great view," I mocked the skeleton, pulling away from the telescope and wiping the paint off with my sleeve. I had expected to find Sans stifling a laugh, or just flat out giggling like a school girl, but instead, he looked weirdly unsettled.

"What happened to you, Kid?"

 _Oh, what, the gaping hole in my back?_ "Undyne happened," I answered coldly. Somehow the wound had escaped my mind entirely, but now that he had so kindly brought it up, it started to burn all over again. "Nice of you to notice."

"Nice Cream Guy's hanging around over there tryin' to make a living. Why don'tcha go grab a cone or two?" Sans suggested, pointing down a separate corridor off the main path. "Should patch ya up."

 _That bunny guy with the weird mood swings?_ "Why's he always selling nice cream in the dumbest places?" I asked, but wasn't planning on waiting for an answer. For some reason, knowing Sans had my back, lazy as he was, had reinvigorated my confidence enough to get me itching to be on the move again. Even if I wasn't sure I could fully trust him, any support by this point in the game was better than none at all.

"Good luck, Kid."

"Thanks, Sansy. Hopefully I won't need it."

The Nice Cream Guy had perked up when I entered his small side room, as expected, and immediately started shoving nice creams down my throat. Which, thankfully, sounds a lot more disgusting and vulgar than it actually was. I grabbed three of them, one to heal off the nasty gash across my back, and another two stored in a couple of, "No-thaw containers, invented by the great Doctor Alphys!" as the hare had put it. Not sure how miniature coolers were so high-tech they were worthy of congratulating the inventor every time you use them, but I didn't care to question it.

"Still no luck with drawing in customers, huh?" I asked, more facetious than anything else.

That question alone was almost enough to pull the rabbit back into his funk. "Yeah...no...and still no idea why people aren't showing up, either. I even took your advice and moved shop somewhere else."

 _Seriously?_ "Dude, I said to go somewhere _hot_ to sell these things!"

"No, you said 'most people wouldn't stomach cold food in the snow!'"

I narrowed my eyes. "Okay, fine. _Now_ I'm telling you to go somewhere hot as the center of the goddamn earth. Capiche?"

"Hmm...Got it! Now, I _really_ know the perfect spot! Thanks!"

When I returned to the main cave, Sans and his telescope had disappeared without a trace - not even a light stench of ketchup. The vacant spot seemed very out of place without the skeleton inhabiting it. I couldn't help but wondered if he had packed it up and lugged it away like a bulky folding chair, or if he had simply used one of his "shortcuts" to leave with it quickly. Probably the latter, since there was no reason for him to waste any more energy than he needed to. That had to be why I never saw him walking anywhere.

 _But why the hell would he bother keeping it a secret? Tons of monsters have crazy abilities down here, like Tori's fireballs, or Undyne's spear conjuring shit. It doesn't make any sense..._

"Next time I see him, I'll get to the bottom of it," I said out loud, just to make it as official as possible. "And this time, I won't take 'what're ya talking about?' for an answer."

 _Great, now stop talking to yourself. It's weird._

 _Fine. But don't expect anything from me for your birthday, asshole._

* * *

Waterfall was already a pretty strange place. (Go figure, as if the radioactive mushrooms, seemingly endless water supply, walking bathtubs, and sparkling gemstones on the ceiling weren't any indication.) Yet every time I dared to think I had seen everything the Underground had to offer, I was instantly blown away by something doubtlessly more insane, or downright jaw-dropping.

This, more than ever, was one of those jaw-dropping times.

An intricate network of rivers wove through the stone floor like one huge spiderweb, making the cave seem far more vast than I had originally cared to notice. The glow of those same gemstones encased in the ceiling seem to intensify a thousand fold, painting the walls, the tall fungi growing like oak trees, and everything else they touched in their calming blue aura. What really made me do a double take, and eventually a triple take moments later, was the way the light caught the water. It formed a sky blue color so bright, so cool, so inviting that a dip in the stream didn't seem like such a terrible idea anymore. Even the lily pads and cattails resting like geese on the water's surface appeared as silhouettes against the shining liquid.

I tried to muster up anything clever to say for my nonexistent audience, but found my lips glued shut. My heart, for the first time since being attacked by Undyne, slowed it's pace to something just shy of normal. I let myself be absorbed in the serenity of the scene, in the sudden life of Waterfall, for only a few moments.

 _...Okay, that's enough for now. This moment could be easily ruined by just one spear up my ass, after all._

I made my way down the riverbed, occasionally crossing over the water thanks to some conveniently placed bridges. Felt better to be in a bigger, less crowded space where I could see Undyne or any other hostile monster coming from a mile away. Not that Snowdin or even the Ruins had been crowded or anything, but there seemed to be far fewer monsters creeping around Waterfall. Aside from Sans, and counting even _him_ was a bit of a stretch. It was as if the Royal Guard hadn't prepared for any human to make it this far in the first place. Come to think of it, that was probably why the captain herself lingered and crept in the darkness of Waterfall. And that ill-preparation left me feeling somehow worse off.

"So? Don't you have any wishes to make?"

The hairs on the back of my neck jolted up for a split second, until I recognized the monotonous voice of an echo flower. It blended in with the color of the water so well I had almost missed it. Another flower nearby joined in the bland chorus before I could so much as blink.

"Hmm...just one, but it's kind of stupid."

 _I'm sure it is.  
_

"Don't say that! I promise I won't laugh," calls another one, more desperate to join the conversation than the lily pads were to not be dragged off by the swift current and thrown over the waterfall.

 _Really? I make no such promises._

Each voice sounded the same when repeated by the flora, but it wasn't difficult to tell the flowers' speeches belonged to two different monsters. Thankfully there weren't any others nearby, and the ones within earshot only repeated the same sentence endlessly. I didn't have any interest hearing about their petty wishes, anyway.

By the end of the room the cave began to curve back in on itself, and I was beyond disappointed to see the gemstones begin to dim again, the water beginning to deter back to its ugly dark blue, the color of a dirty, barren night sky.

 _Back to grimy, dingy Waterfall, I guess. Dammit...  
_

The plaque on the wall didn't help to heighten my spirits either. It continued the history depicted by the last row of them I had seen, where I had my...incident. Needless to say, I wasn't happy about finding any more. My eyes hardly skimmed the text, but it was just enough to make out the words clear enough.

 **The power to take their Souls. This is the power that the humans feared.  
**

In the next room over, which was only one long straight path surrounded on either side by water, my phone rang again.

"How's the scheming going, Paps?" I answered, deciding to walk and talk at the same time. If Undyne wanted to rear her ugly mug around here, I could just as easily chuck the phone at her for a quick distraction.

"'Scheming!?' The Great Papyrus does not...well, okay, maybe a little, BUT NEVER AGAINST FRIENDS!"

"Alright, Papyrus, chill out! You'll blow my damn eardrums off," I complained. At that same moment, I could've sworn I heard something shift in the water, but it was so small and irrelevant I brushed it off as my imagination.

Never a smart thing to do when people are out to kill you.

"My apologies. So, Human, do you remember when I asked you what you were wearing earlier?"

"In a completely non-suspicious way?"

 _Splash._

"There it is again..." I muttered, turning to investigate the noise. It sounded fainter than a mouse's squeak in a sea of people, but it was definitely there, and I couldn't help but get paranoid over it the second time.

"Human? Are you listening to me?" Papyrus asked, sounding genuinely insulted.

"Yeah, yeah, something about...kumquats or something, go on?" I reassured the lanky skeleton, silently slipping on my tough glove over my free hand. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted a series of ripples in the water.

 _Something's following me._

"As I was saying, you may have guessed I was asking you for another friend of mine," he continued, apparently unable to figure out I had my attention directed somewhere completely unrelated. "And, I normally try not to ever, _ever_ lie, but this particular friend's opinion of you is very...murdery."

 _Was something just bubbling in the water? And what the hell is that stench!? Smells like a back alley sushi shop...  
_

"So, I decided it was for the best to tell her you were not, in fact, wearing a tutu and baseball cap, but instead a pair of jeans and a black jacket."

"Wait, WHAT?!" I screamed into the receiver. This time, it was my turn to shatter Papyrus' hearing. "The hell is wrong with you!?"

"I know, it is wrong of me to betray one friend for another, but I can't let Undyne harm you!"

"Papyrus, if you're gonna disregard the lie I make up anyway, why would you tell her _exactly what I'm actually wearing_?"

Silence on the other end. "...You were lying?"

I hung up, shoved the phone in my pocket, and silenced it moments later when it rang again. I was too furious at the skeleton; I worried if I prolonged the conversation I might end up snapping the phone in half. Of all the stupid shit I'd seen him do, this one was the sewage-filled icing on that disgusting, shit-covered cake. Of course Undyne recognized me immediately through the dark of Waterfall, of course she had found me so easily. Because she knew _exactly_ what too look for. Papyrus was out to help me, alright. Help me dig my own grave.

I was so focused on staying angry at Papyrus, I hadn't even noticed the rippling of the water growing more intense, like the rumbling of a volcano as pressure builds below its surface. Even in my ignorance, though, I couldn't miss bright yellow tentacles slithering out of the murky liquid moments later.

My eyes widened. The first instinct I had was to bolt, but two more tentacles flopped haphazardly across the pathway on either side of me, each big enough to block the way forward _and_ back. Waves created by the creature crashed at my feet, and a shower of droplets and tiny bits of rock rained down on me like hail as the largest part of the creature slowly emerged, a big bulb that barely fit underneath the ceiling. All that was missing from the scene was a dark and stormy night.

 _Seriously? A freaking Krakken?! I'd rather take my chances with the spear-conjuring lunatic, thank you very much._

My mind was drawing a complete blank, and the rest of me refused to move. What was I supposed to do? Stand still punching at its tentacles until it gave up? Swimming around the monster was a possibility, but no amount of fear, money, or desperation could get me in the water with that thing. All the while I was stuck thinking up a solution, the monster's thrashing only seemed to grow more violent.

 _Punching it is._

While more grotesque vines - no, tentacles, _don't get distracted_ \- popped up around me, I sprinted over to the one blocking my way forward. The world started running at half-speed as my fist reared back, my feet planted firmly on the ground, and a rogue battle cry came flying from my mouth...

...Then, all the racket of movement instantly ceased, and I heard the softest, most nervous voice to ever come out of a giant sea monster's mouth.

"H-hey...I noticed you were...here..."

 _He's friendly. Of course he's friendly. Sure there are killer bathtubs and sword wielding dogs, but krakkens? Those guys, you can trust._

I pulled away from the tentacle and turned to face the monster, startled by its massive puppy-dog eyes, which wouldn't have looked any more out of place on the side of a building. It wore a comically large and nervous smile across its face and was either dripping with water, or sweating bullets.

"I-I'm Onionsan! Onionsan, y'hear!" He managed a brief burst of confidence, but it only served to highlight his awkwardness even further. 'Course, this whole situation didn't have much potential to get any more awkward than it already was.

"Uh...hi?" I should have been relieved to find out Onionsan was a gentle giant (with an...unfortunate name), but something about his presence alone unnerved me, the same feeling you'd get hanging around a wanted criminal. If I had to make a guess, it probably involved those massive, clumsy tentacles that were constantly wriggling around so much they threatened to knock me into the ravine bellow. Plus, he had interrupted my "me time," an offense punishable only by severe degradation. "You mind moving this outta my way, Calamari?"

Calamari—or Onionsan, I had already forgotten which was his actual name—shakily retracted the tentacle in my way. "O-oh, yeah, sorry about that!" the squid sputtered.

"Thanks," I said conclusively, as if there were any hint of a chance Calamari would actually drop the conversation and leave me be that easily. I knew his type, the kind of guy who tries to choose his words carefully, like a card player who takes an eternity examining his hand to make the perfect move, but still trips up and plays wrong anyway. I could tell from the way he had tried and failed to pass himself off as someone worth my time. Plenty of annoying school kids, and adults for that matter, acted oblivious to the fact you wanted nothing to do with them, or even flat-out ignored any not-so-subtle hints you had been dropping _leniently_. The kind that claimed to be dedicated to "cheering you up," but really are only scrambling for ways to further validate their own existences. I didn't need to so much as glance at it to realize the giant squid was swimming along beside me, waiting for me to present some nonexistent opportunity for him to dip his head further into my business.

"You're visiting Waterfall, huh!?" Calamari chimed in again, right on cue.

"Sure," I answered, figuring how I could be as vague as possible. "I'm on a little...vacation."

Without pausing for a single breath, the squid continued in his oddly high-pitched voice, "It's great here, huh!? You love it here, huh!?"

 _Might as well test the waters of this guy's stupidity while I have the chance._

"Sure," I said again, as disinterested as the first time. "I figured it'd be a great place to take a little time off _for myself_. Not many people to chew my ear off around here, yeah?"

"Y-yeah! I like it too...It's my big favorite..."

 _Welp. Can't get much more obvious than that without tattooing "Flop off, sushi-legs," across the back of my neck. Looks like I was right about this guy...  
_

"Even though, the water's getting so shallow here..."

For the first time since I started walking through this incredibly long room, I was almost tempted to come to a stop. Calamari had managed to spout out an interesting little tidbit, whether it was on purpose or just dumb luck. "Looks pretty deep to me..."

When I cast a glance back at the squid, I noticed he had ducked to hide his face in the apparent shallows. "I, actually have sit down all the time, but..." his voice bubbled to life. A moment later, he shot out of the water like a cannonball, making a sudden effort to shake off his darkened mood. "B-but hey! That's okay! It beats moving to the city!"

"'Course it does..." _Sounds like you need to convince yourself first before trying it out on me, pal._

"You're right!"

 _Did I say something?_

"W-why would I wanna go live in a crowded aquarium with all my friends, anyway?"

The forced optimism in his voice stuck out like a sore thumb. Or a giant sea monster hiding out in a cave. "You managed to find some suckers willing to be friends with you?" For the first time, the curtness in my voice didn't come willingly, but was dragged out by force of habit. I almost found myself regretting it.

"K-kinda...until they all left without me."

I stopped in my tracks completely. "They abandoned you?"

A spark of pain flashed across Calamari's face and in the big, black pupils of his eyes, disappearing as quickly as it came. My question hung in the air like a thick cobweb, until the squid sank beneath the surface of the water for a second time, as if trying to disappear from the conversation. Except now, I actually wanted to see it through to the end.

The cave went dead silent for a while, even the water seemed still as ice and makes no sound, until Onionsan poked his head up again. "They uh...they left for city while I was sleeping, I guess," he mumbled slowly, now refusing to meet my gaze. "I thought we had agreed on staying, and that the water draining was fine...and the aquarium is full, anyway...as if I _wanted_ to go with them..."

 _Poor sap. Even his friends couldn't stand him._

"Sorry, can't say I know the feeling," I shrugged. "But if they really did take off behind your back, they're probably a 'buncha assholes anyway."

My words of wisdom didn't help cheer up the squid, not that I had expected them to in the first place. Onionsan sat with his tentacles pulled to his...chest (wasn't planning on majoring in squid anatomy), eyes darting to everything in the room except for me.

 _Bet he's regretting giving me the time of day now,_ I thought, turning to leave without so much as a "see ya, hope you're not too upset about being completely alone in the world for life."

"You know what, you're right! Who needs those guys!"

 _Guess he's not too upset._

As suddenly as I'd given up on the monster, he'd shot out of the water like a lightning bolt, the expression on his face equally as bright. The force of his outburst shook the entirety of Waterfall, and I stumbled trying to keep myself from falling off the narrow pathway.

"I am?"

"It's all okay, y'hear!" The ground continued to shake as he flopped up and down like the world's largest flounder in the middle of the world's loudest rave. "Undyne's gonna fix everything, y'hear! I'm gonna get out of here and live in the ocean!"

"Great..." I muttered weakly. Between the constant shaking and the grim reminder that a crazy laser-spear-chucking knight was stalking me, my stomach felt ready to empty what remained of Grillby's burger and the nice cream into Onionsan's little reservoir. _That's, what, the ten millionth person who indirectly wants me dead?_

I spun around, desperately looking for some kind of escape, and thank god, the end of the room was only meters away. The cavern wall cut across Calamari's little pool of water, rendering him unable to follow me any further. A few more steps and I'd be home free, on my own again. If I could thank Onionsan for any one thing, he had effectively crushed any desire I had to travel with a companion.

"Well, good luck with that," I said quickly, ducking out of the room and refusing to look back.

"Thanks!" Onionsan yelled back. As he began to lower himself underwater one final time, I heard him call out to me, "Have a good time in Waterfallllllllllllllllll~"


	21. Chapter 21: Hills & Valleys

**This power, to take the soul of a human, has no counter. Indeed, a human cannot take a monster's soul. When a monster dies, its soul vanishes, shattering into uncertainty, and an incredible power would be needed to take the soul of a living monster...**

 **...But there is a single exception. There exists a unique species of monster, a "Boss Monster," whose soul is strong enough to persist after death, if only for a few moments. A human could potentially harness the power of this soul, but this has never happened. And now...**

 _...It never will._

 _Cheerful._

After eluding Onionsan, I was greeted by the same musty, repetitive caverns of Waterfall, which only aggravated me more now that I had witnessed its true colors. Specifically sky blue, it had quite the affinity for sky blue, a color I had never imagined myself missing before that moment. 'Guess anything could seem beautiful after staring at washed out grays & blues for hours on end. Like a flower refusing to bloom, Waterfall felt completely content staying shriveled up and keeping its real beauty hidden.

Somewhere between boring corridor number four and ugly hallway number ten, I picked up on a sound I hadn't heard in a long time. It seemed distant and faint, even harder to pick out beneath the trickling of water, but I knew I hadn't heard wrong.

The movement of air. Wind. The pure, undiluted sound of something _outside_. It was enough to make my heart start bounding up and down like a dog trapped in a cage for days, finally allowed to run free. I discarded any scrap of patience I had left. Eagerly rushing down the hallways, I remembered the feeling of running on the streets of Ebott, the wind blasting through my hair, some of the only times I could forget about how crummy the city really was. The only reason I didn't fade into full flash-back mode was fear of running head-first into Sans again. Or, even worse, Undyne.

Later I wished I had simply taken off, because I would've ignored the light drops of water beginning to pour from the cracked ceiling, and subsequently the little statue tucked against the wall.

I slowed down enough to get a good look at the sculpture, although there wasn't much to look at. The crude shape it managed to hold vaguely resembled a little monster with horns poking out of its head. Its arms were curved inward and its hands were cupped, as if it were trying to hold on to something. The statue could have been decades old for all I knew; the stone was either completely smoothed over and worn down from the water constantly running over it, like some kind of abandoned dam, or rugged and cracked. Every inch of it was soaked through, resulting in a washed-out muddy color that wasn't exactly easy on the eyes.

But the design of the statue wasn't what stopped me, despite the drops of water pestering me to keep moving. It was the way those same water droplets streaked and rolled down the rock face so...gracefully, as if they were tears, that dragged me to a halt.

Staring at the lonely statue, at the cracked and misshapen pieces scattered at its feet that had given up and fallen off, triggered that same reflexive feeling I had gotten when listening to that snowman's story all that time ago in Snowdin. It started off as a simple knot in my stomach, slowly growing and festering until it corrupted every part of my being, like a disease. A lump the size of a rock formed in my throat, and I found myself unable to think, speak, or breathe properly. It showed no signs of fading, not unless I did... _something._

 _But what? And why does it matter so much to me?_

Something clambered to my right, jolting me to full attention. My first thought shot to Undyne, but she wouldn't be so clumsy as to alert me to her presence right away. As I'd expected, it turned out to be nothing but a false alarm. Just a garbage can that had been carelessly knocked over around the nearest corner, and its contents had spilled from wall to wall. Instead of trash, the can had held a bunch of dusty umbrellas that appeared nearly as ancient as the cave itself.

"Nice," I said to myself, feeling my throat muscles relax back to their normal state. Although I didn't typically mind rain, I wasn't about to pass up the opportunity for a free umbrella, either. Bending over to pick one up for myself, my gaze couldn't help but drift back to the statue. My eyes once again glazed over the forgotten stone, rounded earth, missing chunks that were now rubble sitting at its feet, and its tightly clasped hands, seeming strong as metal gauntlets despite the passing of time...but with one small hole through the center, too perfectly rounded to be a mistake, or a result of being left alone for an eternity.

Without a single sound aside from the scraping of plastic against rock, I slipped a second umbrella through the hole and popped open the top. The thin fabric barely expanded enough to cover the whole statue, but it was enough to halt the majority of the droplets from setting foot on it. I stood there for a minute, watching the rock begin to dry, and subsequently the flow of tears come to a halt. My hand, still resting on the hilt of the umbrella, began to slide over the rough edges of the statue, feeling a strange sense of...warmth beating from somewhere inside. _God dammit, this place really is_ _driving me insane..._

 _...Something clicked...?_

 _...Music._

A few notes fluttered out from beneath the surface of the statue, and more followed in it's current, until an entire melody sounded off of every wall. The song playing was nothing more than a series of high and low notes, coursing up and down like the tides of the ocean, but managed to sound both somber and serene at the same time. My mind had switched off so that I might listen more closely without any distractions. Eventually the notes swam and pooled together in my head, and I imagined once again the beauty Waterfall often refused to show, the warmth of and of another place I couldn't quite describe, but felt somehow familiar...

"I've heard this somewhere before," I decided at last, without the slightest idea where the thought had originated from. I searched for any deeply rooted memory of the song, possibly from my seemingly ancient childhood, and found none. But I couldn't shake the feeling this wasn't just a little coincidence, that I hadn't simply mistaken it for another song. "Where is it even coming from, anyway? This thing doesn't exactly have any built-in speakers..."

Through the cracks in the stone, I could make out the simple shape of a box resting on the inside of the sculpture, wearing it like a suit of armor. _A music box_ , I realized. I tried to think of any time in my life where I had interacted with, or even seen a music box in real life, but for the second time came up with nothing. No matter how hard I tried, those unattainable distant memories slipped through my fingertips like shadows, if they even existed at all. With every second that passed by as I failed to make any sort of connection to the statue, with each road that lead to nowhere, the song grew less calming and more...chilling, as if the notes themselves were crawling along my spine.

When I could no longer tell the difference between the drops of rain and beads of sweat rolling down my face, and my stomach felt as if I had swallowed one of the chunks of rock sitting at the statue's base, I tore myself away from the scene and opened my own umbrella. The memory was soon shoved down to the depths of my thoughts, along with a seemingly infinite whirlpool of shit I couldn't keep track of anymore.

The cracks in the ceiling began to widen, and the droplets of water became a downpour quicker than I could blink. I weaved my way around the shallow puddles that had collected at my feet, focusing on the annoying _pitter-patter_ of the raindrops against the ground to distract myself from...just about everything else in existence. Though it didn't help to block out a certain sharp voice that cut my ears like glass.

"Yo, you have an umbrella! Awesome!" Monster Kid, without thinking even once, threw himself from whatever little nook he was hiding from the rain in and snuggled right beside me under the umbrella. When he noticed the dirty look I was giving him, his smile quickly faded. "What's up? You look kinda pissed."

"...It's nothing," I said after a while, continuing forward while stomaching the urge to toss his skinny ass back in the flurries of rain. It was easy to forget that the only reason he'd decided to buddy up with me at all was his own lack of arms to carry an umbrella himself. Besides, his patronizing eagerness and alacrity served as a great distraction from...yeah, just about everything else in the universe. "Guess I'm just a little on edge. Ya know, the thought of running into Undyne again has me all...excited."

"Oh! Yeah, me too!" Monster Kid agreed, once again buying my apparently _very_ convincing act. _God damn, if only normal people were this easy to fool..._

We walked in silence for only a few moments before the path turned, and Monster Kid decided to open his mouth again. "Man, Undyne is sooooooo cool."

"What tipped you off first? The badass armor, or the fact that she can conjure laser spears at will?" I offered.

He snickered. "Both. Plus, she beats up the bad guys, and _never_ loses!" He looked me dead in the eyes, with an uncannily innocent glean, before continuing, "If I were a human, I would wet the bed every night knowing she was gonna beat me up!" And then he released a laugh deeper than the hole I had fallen into to get here in the first place, as if he really were just casually hanging out with a friend, and not actively supporting my death directly in front of my face.

"Yeah..." I waited until he was no longer staring at me to let out a long, slow shudder. _Little twerp doesn't know any better,_ I reminded myself, but I was already sick of repeating that same mentality over and over again to hide from the grim reality of the situation. If he found out I was a human, there wasn't a shred of doubt in my mind he'd run off screaming at the top of his lungs for Undyne to come save him, tripping over his own feet every step of the way.

"Dude, seriously, you feeling okay? You look ready to barf."

 _All over your face, preferably._ "I'm fine, it's just...allergies."

"Oh. You're not used to Waterfall yet? Where do you live, anyway? I can't remember seeing you around Snowdin until just yesterday."

"I'm from the capital," I answered instantaneously, as if the lie had come second-nature to me. Sans had recommended I spout that at anyone who cared enough to ask, and unlike most of what he told me, it was sound advice. "And that's all I need to tell you, small-fry, so don't bother prying."

"Bu-" He tried to argue, but my death-glares were getting so perfectly malevolent, they shut him up before he could get so much as a word in. My success briefly put a smirk back up on my face, even though putting the small-fry down didn't feel as gratifying as it should have.

 _Small Fry...guess it has a better ring to it than Monster Kid._

After being silenced, Small Fry stayed quiet for another minute of two, starting to trail behind a little bit. His lips were pulled into a tight frown that I was sure tons of repressed questions were attempting to tear open, and the droplets splashing onto his head didn't seem to perk him up in the slightest. Seeing the half-pint looking all depressed was somehow even worse than having him chew my ear to bloody pieces.

After I had decided the silence had gotten far too thick, and that asking about his arms would probably piss him off even more, I called behind me, "Getting kinda bored over here. Got any good stories, Small Fry?"

"...Small Fry..." I heard him grumble name under his breath, as if placing a curse on it, but he didn't hesitate to catch up to me. "Yeah, I got some."

Without thinking, I playfully elbowed him in the shoulder. "Well, lets hear one. C'mon, I don't have all day. Cave won't go on forever and all that crap."

 _It really can't go on forever, right?_

 _Can it?_

"Okay, so this one time, we had a school project where we had to take care of a flower," Small Fry began, excitement already beginning to flood his voice once again. "The king – we _had_ to call him 'Mr. Dreemur' – volunteered to donate his own flowers."

"Right. So, remember when I asked for a _good_ story?" I asked, cracking a mischievous grin.

"I'm getting to the good part, just hold on!" Small Fry shouted. As his temper began to rise, the distant sound of rushing air seemed intensify as well. "So, the king ended up coming to school and teaching the class about responsibility and..."

I raised an eyebrow. "And what?"

A small smile spread across his face like butter on toast. "...No, you're right. This story blows chunks."

The shift in tone was enough to make me laugh, and soon Small Fry joined in. The two of us stood there giggling like the school friends he obviously wished we could be, and for a moment, we almost were. I couldn't remember the last time I had shared a laugh with someone this close to my age, and although the feeling was brief and near alien to me, it felt...relieving, at least for a moment.

"Yo, can you imagine how COOL it would be be if _Undyne_ came to school!?" Small Fry gasped in between laughs. "She could beat up all the teachers!"

"Now there's an idea," I agreed. A few hideously wrinkled faces in desperate need of some rearranging came to mind. Granted, the image of Undyne busting down the door to my classroom and tackling my teacher under the desk proved to be more terrifying than entertaining, at least as long as my life remained on the line.

"Seriously though, Undyne would never beat up the teachers..." Small Fry insisted, his laughter beginning to die out as well. Either that, or the steadily rising wind was drowning him out. "She's _way_ too cool to ever hurt an innocent person!"

I started to respond, but stopped myself for two reasons. The first: I was still in the process of kissing Undyne's ass to keep Small Fry happy. And the second: the cave walls had begun to shrink away around us, and we were braving the brunt of a wind storm.

It had happened so suddenly, but just like that, we were out. Out of the rain, out of the confines of Waterfall, out against the open night sky - or at least, the illusion of one. My eyes lit up under the endless numbers of gemstones pulsing with light in the distance, but immediately threatened to slam back shut against the howling wind. The two of us might as well have been caught in the middle of a tornado on top of a skyscraper, the sound was so muting.

"Where are we?" I screamed at the kid, uselessly flailing my arms around to deflect the air currents. I finally remembered to close my umbrella after a good five seconds of stupidity.

"Still in Waterfall, man!" Small Fry cried, choosing to take the lead. He wasn't fortunate enough to have anything to shield himself with. "We can get back in the cave up ahead!"

 _Yeah, fantastic. Out of the caves for a solid two seconds and we're already cowering back in..._

We had to tread carefully, as the path was narrow and the cliffs on either side of us were steep and _very_ painful-looking. After a minute of shuffling forward in the most awkward way possible, one foot in front of the other scouting for rocks to trip over, the wind began to die down enough for me to lower my arms from my face. Small Fry had stopped pressing on just in front of me, eyes fixated on something off the beaten path.

Far off in the distance, barely in view, faded and drenched in shadows like a specter, perched a massive castle. Although the details of the structure were hard to pick out from so far away, that didn't stop the image from pushing an intimidating sense of dread on my shoulders. Multiple towers grew out from every visible point on the base of the castle, reaching up endlessly towards the roof of the cavern, as if trying to claw their way out of the pit they inhabited. The way it leaned over the chasm between us, looking out for intruders, watching for any hint of movement, only served to intensify the foreboding nature of the place.

 _That must be where he lives. The king of monsters...honestly was expecting something a bit bigger, but I guess it gets the job done. 'Strike fear into the hearts of our enemies' and all that jazz._

The Fry and I stared at the castle, entranced, until the storm began to pick up once again. "We've gotta keep moving," I urged, tugging Small Fry away from the scene. Even as I pulled him, his feet stayed rooted to the spot, and eyes glued to the castle, totally sucked into its presence. The way the light fell over his face made his expression difficult to read. It was time to change tactics. "Hey, I think I _just_ saw Undyne giving out autographs up ahead!"

Such an unbelievably stupid and childish claim was perfect for getting a reaction out of Small Fry. "Wh-where!?" he cried. Even as the words left his mouth, he seemed to realize the lie. While I dragged him towards Waterfall's re-entrance by the...stub, he added, "C'mon dude, that's low!"

"Not...really..."

We ducked back into the cave, relieved to see the flow of water had been stemmed in that particular section. Another basket sat practically bulging with umbrellas, which I didn't hesitate to toss mine into. It only served as added baggage, and would probably be negligible help in any serious fight as a weapon, even compared to the toy knife I had kept since the start of my journey. I figured hacking at Undyne's helmet with an umbrella might buy me an extra second to catch my breath before she drove a spear through my spine.

With that small victory, however, came a greater inconvenience. I uttered a curse under my breath and rushed forward to find any other way around it, but it was no use. The path was blocked by a wall more than double my height.

 _No._ I took a few steps back, got another running start, and tried to leap and climb my way up the wall, but it was no use. My fingers slid uselessly off the cracked surface, a full foot away from the top of the ledge.

"Yo, no way! The path's blocked!" Small Fry cried, moving to catch up with me.

"Gee, thanks for the _ingenious_ observation," I spat, kicking at the wall in frustration. When it refused to budge, I kicked it again, harder this time. Surely if I hit it hard enough, it would soften up and move out of my way eventually, right? _Dammit, I_ _didn't come all this way to be walled in with that psycho killer and her number one fan..._

I imagined doubling back to find another route, playing right into Undyne's clutches. Surely she was waiting on the way back, hiding behind every rock, under the cover of every shadow, ready to lash out...

"Dude, don't worry about it," he tried to reassure me. "I'm _pretty_ sure I know another we can go, but we gotta go back a little bit..."

"I don't have time," I fired back, forgetting my charade for a split second.

"Really? I wanna see Undyne too, but she's not really going anywhere, is she?"

 _Crap._ I bit my lip, searching for the right words. "Some things are a bit more important than stalking your heroes, Small Fry."

Just as I said it, I knew that I had given away my lie, the one I had been spouting practically since I had first met the kid in Snowdin. I tried to search his facial expression for any hint of realization, his eyes widening or narrowing, something along those lines. But neither of those happened. Instead, Small Fry marched right up to the wall, holding himself up higher than I had seen him before, and said, "Here, climb on my shoulders."

After a moment of waiting for him to cut the heroics, I frowned. "Wait, seriously?"

He nodded vigorously, almost banging his head on the rock. "Yeah! Whatever you need to do, it's probably more important than tracking down Undyne, anyway. Now come on, holding my shoulders like this is getting kinda hard..."

 _Is he just gonna gloss over the fact that I lied straight to his face multiple times?_ I certainly wasn't about to bring it up to him. Without hesitating any longer, I prepared myself once again for the climb.

"You ready? I'm not exactly light as a feather, and you're not exactly a bodybuilder."

He turned to face away from me and braced himself. "Ready!"

On his signal, I bounded up to the poor kid and threw my arms around his shoulder, heaving myself until I had one foot planted on each side. Even though I was nearly twice his size, Small Fry managed to hold his form decently well, like a twig holding up a sack of potatoes. He shook and squirmed every second I was on him, threatening to snap, so I threw my arms up above my head as quickly as possible. This time, the entire palm of my hand made it up over the surface of the ledge, and I managed to get a hold on it. A moment later and Monster Kid was alleviated of the stress, and I had pulled myself up.

"Still in one piece down there?" I called, climbing to my feet. To my surprise, Small Fry was standing perfectly upright once again, as if the transaction hadn't phased him at all. _Tougher than he looks..._

"No sweat!" he confirmed, and as much as I refused to believe it, he really didn't seem like he was bluffing. Neither his posture nor his voice had wavered in the slightest. _Way tougher than he looks..._

"Good luck with whatever you gotta do!" Just like that, he was turning to head back the way we had come.

"Where are you going?!"

"Don't worry about me! I always find a way to keep moving forward!" Stopping to face me once again, he puffed out his chest and bellowed, "No gap is too wide, no distance is too far, and no wall is too high to hold me back!" Even though it sounded like something he picked up off of a cheesy superhero show, he said it with so much confidence, so much passion, he convinced me of it instantly. With just that one simple phrase, I became one hundred percent sure I hadn't seen the last of the little guy.

I smiled. "Except for this wall, right?"

"That's besides the point!" he yelled back, catching himself as he tripped.

"That is literally the foundation of the point."

"I'll see ya later!"

I waited until the very last speck of his tail had disappeared from view before whispering "thanks" under my breath.

* * *

Small Fry (the name no longer sounded appropriate for him, but I couldn't come up with anything better at the time) and I had split up, but my spirits oddly didn't plummet as I had expected them to. Despite being on my own again, Small Fry's gesture had reminded me that the odds weren't quite one against one thousand. They were about...four or five against a thousand, give or take a few from either side. It wasn't much, but the thought kept me sane at the very least.

Keeping in theme with the rest of the Underground, however, I bumped into something perfectly capable of destroying my good-mood-only moments. This time, however, my own mood was the last thing on my mind.

This revelation was infinitely more important than just one person.

In the now extremely dim light, so faint I could barely make out the words, hung two more plaques.

 **The humans, afraid of our power, declared war on us.**

 **Without warning, they mercilessly began slaughtering our kind.**

 **In the end, it could hardly be called a war.**

 **United, the humans were far too powerful, and us monsters, far too weak.**

 **Not a single Soul was taken, not a drop of blood was spilled, and yet countless monsters were reduced to nothing more than piles of dust...  
**

 _It was a massacre.  
_

Although the faded text hardly tried to paint a vivid picture of the slaughter, it was as though the memories were burned into my mind. Images of a barren wasteland, scorched desert earth littered with thick layers of dust, the corpses of monsters speared and gutted by the humans, forcefully replaced the tired walls of Waterfall. Only my refusal to slip away again forced them off me. My lip trembled, so I clamped my mouth shut. My hands shook, so I shoved them into my pockets. But there was no defense against my blood pumping, threatening to burst from every vain like a dam up against too much water.

 _No wonder they...she...wants me dead so badly. It makes so much sense now. It makes too much sense now, and I wish it didn't.  
_

What I thought was a simple revenge story turned out to be so much more complicated than that. It wasn't just revenge for a loss, but a criminal injustice, and one I almost wanted to see righted myself, a sort of "serves those bastards right!" mentality. But even if monsters made it back to the surface, how could they conquer the human race now? I hadn't seen a weapon greater than even a spear in all my time in the Underground, against the limitless modern armies of humans. If anything, they would only get themselves slaughtered for a second time.

Only one more reason to escape this place with my life, as if I were begging any more.

To make matters worse, my days of traveling over sketchy bridges seemingly weren't over yet. The one I found myself at was at least wider than the previous, and at a glance appeared more stable. 'Problem was, everything else surrounding the bridge was swallowed in an inky black abyss, save for another identical bridge running a short ways below me. Any tiny remnants of light present in Waterfall had burned out and died, leaving me unable to see anything but vague shapes and outlines, aside from the path a few feet in front of me.

I took a deep breath, but it didn't help shake the feeling biting at my neck that something was about to go horribly wrong. The thought of Undyne nipping at my heels was the only thing that kept me from heading back to find Small Fry and the alternate path he was positive existed.

 _It's just an oversized plank of wood,_ I thought, placing my foot on the first board in front of me. _See? Holds up perfectly._

A lack of any and all sound or movement accompanied me as I made the trek across, with no idea where the bridge would end. The room felt so empty and...dead, I couldn't even begin to guess. For all I knew, it was being sucked endlessly into the void, and never came out the other side.

 _Then why the hell would there be a bridge here?_ I tried to keep thinking rationally, but that never seemed to accomplish anything in the Underground.

There was absolutely nothing going on around me to judge time by, aside from my now rhythmic steps across the boardwalk. As far as I was concerned, I had been walking since the beginning of time. All I could do was curl and uncurl my gloved hand, waiting in vain for something to change.

As the thought crossed my mind, I knew I wouldn't have to wait much longer.

I didn't stop when I first caught a glimpse of it, a small blue circle forming along the bridge with no reason for existing at all. My first instinct was to keep moving, until another appeared behind me, and then more, covering my retreat path like a blockade. Then I switched to my second instinct: I started sprinting as fast as I could.

 _Dammit, it's h-_

 _"CRAAAAACK!"_ The wood exploded as spears erupted from every circle, and the entire section of the bridge I had left behind collapsed. I hadn't seen it fall, but the screech made as the last of the boards pulled loose was indication enough. I caught a glimpse of my pursuer on the bridge below me, again completely out of my reach, her one silver eye staring me down through the dark.

Undyne's attacks only intensified as I ran, obliterating more and more trunks of the bridge. They came fast, giving me very little time to weave my way through them before they shot up and split me in two. Dodging was only made harder by the reoccurring awful design of the boardwalk; it spiraled and twisted like the previous, this time adding multiple pathways that lead nowhere to further confuse me, and falling off this time held much higher consequences than splashing around in a little water. All the while, Undyne's heavy footsteps pounded below and behind me, metal against wood, a constant reminder of the monster chasing me.

It wasn't long until I began to slip up, a combination of my panic getting the best of me and the near labyrinth-esque design of my only escape path being the cause. Dead-ends were scattered everywhere, and quickly heading back the way you've came when there are jagged gaps left in your wake proved near impossible. I lost count of the number of times I jumped an empty space that used to be solid, landed with only one foot on solid wood, only to have another spear pop up directly and front of me and nearly knock me off the platform.

 _Another god damn dead end,_ I thought, feeling ready to empty what little contents of my stomach were left after running for so long. But I couldn't stop, the spears were coming so quickly now, and I had a gut feeling I was nearing the end. Probably just a desperate plea to keep myself moving, but it got the job done. My fingers were covered in splinters and my legs in scratches, but they felt pitiful at the thought of a spear sticking through the center of my chest, like some kind of voodoo doll.

My heart leapt when I found it, the bridge extending into a huge open block, completely removing Undyne from view. _This has to be it._

The spears came in larger, more random patterns, but with so much room to avoid them, they barely posed a threat. With a new burst of energy, I darted between every safe spot so quickly you would've sworn I had been doing it my whole life.

The bridge eventually narrowed again, but by that point, Undyne attacked so infrequently I knew I must have lost her. It was just a straight shot forward to the end, and I'd be home free on solid ground.

That was, until reality slapped the idea straight out of my head and presented me with another drop-off into oblivion. I slid to a halt, too bewildered to react at first.

 _No no no, no, it's fine, I'll just go back. There's got to be another way...  
_

...I spun around at the clanking, feeling my entire body go numb, the life sucked out through a straw. Undyne emerged from the darkness, marching forward until her entire set of armor came into view. It seeing dirtier than before and covered in grime, as if she'd been searching for me forever, scouring every place imaginable. Against the backdrop of nothingness, though, she appeared as soul-crushingly intimidating as ever, with a vice-grip on the spear in her right hand.

"C-C-C'mon then," I sputtered, barely able to move my lips. I wondered if she could see me shaking from where she stood, only a few meters away.

She didn't move, didn't even acknowledge my existence, just stood there staring me down for the longest time. Had she hesitated, or did she simply want to savor the kill?

 _When her hand rears back to throw, I'll charge her._ But how could I do that when my legs refused to move? Anticipating the attack alone was enough to make my teeth chatter, but I didn't dare to make the first move.

A big mistake.

Undyne blinked, and a line of spears rained from above. I flinched, preparing to jump out of the way with nowhere to go, but they weren't aiming for me. Before I could blink, they cut through the wood between the stoic knight and I like paper.

For a moment, the whole world shuddered in anticipation. Or at least, that's what it felt like as the bridge beneath my feet began to give way.

I was too shocked to react at first, until the whole chunk I was on began to tip over like a ship sinking on the ocean. By the time I realized exactly what was going on, it was too late. My feet slid out from under me before I even had the chance to make it to safety.

"N-N-No, _please!_ " I cried, viciously clawing at the wood, a primal urge forcing me to find something to cling too.

But there was nothing.

My screams were lost to the overwhelming silence of the world around me, as everything slipped into the endless void.


	22. Chapter 22: Scars

_It was so cold._

 _I had been so sure I was dead, that all of hell was a cold hard ground you spent lying on for all eternity, that I refused to move at first. My body felt stiff and vacant like a mannequin, more plastic than flesh. It wasn't until my fingers closed around something soft and powdery that stung my skin, the same blistering chill biting my face, that I realized I still had some control._

 _I opened my eyes slowly, as if waking from an impossibly long slumber. A slanted view of a snow littered ground rose to meet me. Groaning, I attempted a rocky climb to my feet, made harder by the grading numbness infesting my skull. The world spinning around like a top at mach speed only intensified the feeling of vertigo. Waking up at all should have been relieving, but the nauseating dreams accompanying made the feeling null and void._

 _I waited for the earth to more or less stabilize before wracking up the nerve to look around. Instead of the deepest, darkest pits of Waterfall, a disjointed landscape surrounded me. The air felt paper thin, making it difficult to breath, and subsequently to get any blood flowing to my brain. Unlike my previous dreams that somewhat dabbled close to reality, this one felt particularly fuzzy and...hard to stomach._

 _My arms wrapped around my abdomen, both to hold in any heat I could, and to keep the contents of my stomach from spilling out. The freezing cold, the near pitch-blackness, the wind howling like a pack of wolves at a full moon, the distant ruckus of city life...despite the foreign substance casing the ground, it all felt so familiar..._

 _...Mt. Ebott. Where reality ends and chaos begins._

 _That revelation alone made it so transparently clear what I was looking for. Suddenly, everything looked familiar, and even though the ground wasn't visible, I could effortlessly find the path I needed to follow. My legs were on autopilot, swerving back and forth through the snow, until I had found what I was looking for._

 _The massive hole appeared out of nowhere near the very peak of the mountain, and as the legends go, swallowed up any children who dared to venture this far. As I neared, the memory of that night became increasingly vivid, despite the snowstorm enveloping me growing ever thicker, and the pit somehow more foreboding. All the pieces were falling into place, an exact recreation, soon to be a reenactment, of my entrance into the Underground. Except for one single piece that, time and time again, had refused to fit._

 _As I had anticipated, the girl had appeared yet again._

 _I stopped when she came into view, only a few feet in front of me, with her back turned and leaning over the edge of the pit. She stared down into the endless blackness, as if preparing herself for the end of the world._

 _That's the moment I realized the girl's piece did fit, and had fit every time. Perfectly into my place._

 _"You shouldn't do that," I warned, though I already knew she wouldn't hear me. Strangely, though, a sound did come out, but the voice didn't belong to me. "Nothing good ever comes out of that place. Nothing."_

 _Still, she refused to budge. Good riddance, I decided. With her out of the way, I could finally get my life back. She's a thief. A nuisance. She doesn't deserve to stay here any longer._

 _And yet, even as she began to take her fist step off the cliff, and those horrific vines shot out of the ground to follow her, as everything happened at once, I took a step forward and reached for her._

 _I blinked._

 _I was the one falling. Rushing past blurs of crumbling stone, past tendrils reaching out to pull me into the darkness, I fell. The sensation rose throughout my whole body, further chilling me from the inside out._

 _I blinked again, and the sensation came to a violent halt._

* * *

 _"It sounds like it came from over here..."_

 _The voice drew closer, a child's from the sound of it. So light and innocent...like the song the music box would play._

 _"Oh! You've fallen down, haven't you...?"_

 _It was right above me now, above my wasted form. I imagined, lying there on the cavern floor, that I looked like a crumpled up piece of paper, with my limbs bent in all the wrong directions._

 _"Are you okay?"_

 _My eyes fluttered open, but my vision was so blurry it hardly mattered either way. A figure loomed over me, but even their shape was difficult to make out. Could've been anyone or anything for all I cared. "Do I look okay?" I tried to say, but my lips were sealed shut._

 _"Here, get up..." Now there were hands grasping at my arms, pulling me to my feet. Although it hurt in every corner of my body, I complied, and eventually made it to my knees._

 _"...That's a nice name."_

 _But I hadn't said anything._

 _As the thought crossed my mind, the vision was already fading, a blinding white light taking its place. Time slowed to a crawl._

 _"My name is. . ."_

* * *

I woke up choking on a thick glob of my own blood.

A garbled gasp, unrecognizable as a human sound, rocketed itself out of my mouth as consciousness cruelly returned to me. I laid on my stomach and a set of what must have been shattered ribs, every bone, limb, and bit of flesh screaming for some sort of relief. Just knowing how broken and bloody my body was, essentially reduced to a breathing corpse, terrified me on its own. But I refused to let the shock and fear paralyze me.

Almost as soon as I had woken up, I attempted to slide my arms under myself and push upwards, but the pair were shaking so much, and the slightest bit of pressure threatened to overload my entire nervous system. Vision blackening around the edges, I uttered a pained cry that echoed uselessly off the walls. The last fall had been enough to leave me battered and bloody. Nothing but a skinned knee on the side of the road compared to this.

 _It hurts. Dammit, it hurts so much._

I couldn't give up. I wouldn't go out with nothing more than a pathetic whimper as my last words. But every urge I made to move was rejected by my crumpled form, and who could blame it? I might as well have been burning to death, the agony was so intense, and my legs were doubtlessly broken. Every sickly breath that shuddered through me was released in a fit of ragged coughing that grew weaker over time, as if mimicking the sweeping sound of death itself.

Among the sea of trauma, a spark ignited in my brain. _The nice cream! Where is it?!_

I clumsily tugged at the edges of my pockets with my numb, dented fingers until I realized they were empty. Barren. Vacant, desolate, uninhabited, abandoned. Of course the jars had tumbled out during the fall, most likely shattered into a million pieces when they hit the ground. The nice cream, my only chance of survival, was scattered like dust in the wind.

 _Why couldn't she have made it quick._ My thoughts were becoming tangled in webs, products of a numb and confused brain. _Why'd she have to leave me to suffer?_

 _She's just like the flower. She probably enjoys watching this. Watching me writhe. They're psychotic, all of them._

Another clot of blood ejected from my mouth in a violent cough, splattering on the ground below me. Flowers, I realized. A patch of tiny golden flowers, soft as cotton, on their own little island surrounded by water.

 _Same ones from the Ruins. Guess they weren't enough this time..._

But as the thought ate away at what little remained of my mind - what could have easily been my _last_ thought - I noticed something jutting out of the static water. It was hard to make out, could've been thousands of miles away for all I could tell, but I knew what it belonged to.

The cap for the jar that held my nice cream.

It was at that moment the hardest thirty seconds of my life began. I grit my teeth and bit down as hard as I could before slowly, carefully beginning the extension of my arm. I might as well have been tearing the thing off myself, tissue by tissue, tendon by tendon, blood cell by blood cell. By the time my fingers had fully extended and grabbed hold of the thick bed of flowers, I was howling in anguish, tears streaming down my face and mixing with the blood and sweat, thick like molasses.

My left arm, in somewhat better condition, was less of a hassle to move. Soon my other hand had found support in the flower bed, and I prepared myself for the worst. Turns out, no amount of preparation could ever have been enough.

Dragging my limp body nearly tore apart the fabric of my own universe. More than a few times the sweet embrace of exhaustion and defeat threatened to drag me into a peaceful unconsciousness, and every time I spat weakly back at it. I refused to be beaten, even when the alternative seemed infinitely easier, even when my energy reservoir had long run dry. In a moment of clarity, I decided right then and there, in those eternal thirty seconds, I would die on no force's terms but my own.

I grabbed hold of the jar and yanked it out of the water with the last burst of energy I could muster. The cap, loosened by the force of the fall, came off easily, and in the next second I was eating the very top of the nice cream, my face halfway buried in the jar like a dog. The first bits barely made their way down my throat, but the more I ate, the easier it became to force down more. Bones began reforming, internal bleeding was stemmed, and feeling steadily returned to every nerve. Panting, I brought a now soaked hand to my face and began wiping off any lingering sweat and bloodstains. The coldness of it felt good against my red-hot skin, and helped drag me back to the reality of what had happened, of what I had survived. Aside from my head spinning like it was in outer space, the effects of my little fall had been completely reversed. At least, physically.

Although I tried to focus all of my energy on the here and now, I couldn't stop the events leading up to my fall from replaying over and over again in my head. Undyne chasing me across the bridge, the realization that I was trapped, the look of pure hatred in her eye as she commanded her spears to cut the bridge. And, most vividly, my desperate struggle to cling to something for protection as the last splinters of wood cracked loose, and my plummet into nothingness...

...Strangely, I had no memory of hitting the ground. Instead, it was if I had landed directly in a dream, a fragile realm to hide from the broken state my body was in. Waking up, having all the pain and emotions rushing back at once, was...it was...

 _Terrifying_.

I kicked at the water in frustration. Despite my earlier burst of courage, I was still afraid to die. Undyne's mercilessness, how she had so easily chosen the most torturous way of ending my life without so much as blinking, had a vice grip around my soul. No amount of anger could deter it, and I knew for a fact I held plenty of that to go around.

I dared to test my voice. "Where the hell am I, anyway?" It sounded small and weak, more fitting for a tiny rodent than myself, but I didn't let that take my mind away from other things.

The crevice was nearly pitch black, as I had expected, and I was barely able to make out even the outlines of the waterfall beside me. The entirety of the floor was completely flooded, if the the body of water surrounding me was any indication. Which in turn meant I had to spend even more time wading through the water.

 _Just what I needed._

Even worse than the lighting was the smell. For whatever reason, this stink-hole smelled less like a riverbed and more like a mucky, overgrown swamp. I was convinced something had curled up and died just below the water's surface, and hadn't been carried out by the tides yet.

Only when I had started to get up did my hand brush past something soft, and I remembered the flowers. Now that the..."excitement" of the situation had boiled down, the coincidence of landing on an identical set of flowers for a second time seemed a little too convenient. I wouldn't have been surprised to hear someone had been planting them under my sorry ass every time I needed a nice, cushiony landing.

I stroked the smoothness of the petals for a moment while I gathered the last of my bearings, not sure exactly what I was feeling around for. Some kind of explanation, or a memory perhaps, but my train of thought went careening off the rails.

"Sorry I called you guys bastards..." I muttered apathetically to the plants before sliding into the murky liquid.

The water came up to just above my knees, at least ten degrees warmer than the last puddle I had waded through. Actually, the air felt warmer too; it didn't quite chill me to the bone the way the previous sections of Waterfall had. If not for it stinking like a can of week old tuna baking in the sun, it may have been actually pleasant. And, you know, if the everlasting fear of death wasn't a storm cloud constantly pushing down on my shoulders.

I practically stumbled over the other jar of nice cream, lying just below the water's surface. Even though it was dripping wet, I shoved it into my open coat pocket without a second thought. No chance I'd ever go anywhere without food after that experience.

 _How the hell do I get out of here?_ My brain felt like its tissue rotted further with every step I took in that purgatory, like an apple, infested with insects & vermin. Every glimpse I caught of a wall looked sickeningly identical to the last, every shadow became a cowl for Undyne to hide in, every harmless splash in the water her footsteps inching closer.

 _Keep it together. You've lasted this long, you've survived the worst, just power through for the last lap._

 _How can you be so sure it's the last lap?_

 _...God dammit, I'm doing that thing again._

 _What thing?_

 _You know, the thing where two halves of my - you know what? Never mind._

Visibility was so low, I almost stumbled into the hulking pile of garbage that appeared in front of me, with no other warning than the spike in the stomach-emptying stench polluting the air. The sight, along with the sucker punch to my nostrils, caught me off guard. My hand flew right to my face in a vague attempt to force the volatile chunks of half-digested nice cream back down my throat.

"Ugh, that's sick!" I choked. The mound of trash was a perfect metaphor for both my physical _and_ mental condition at the moment. A grotesque mish-mash of soggy food scraps, shredded cardboard boxes, discarded furniture, smashed electronics, sewage, and bent up hunks of scrap metal, each with its own of coat of dull, rusted armor. All soaking in the water I had willingly washed my face with moments before.

 _Must be a landfill or something...wait..._

 _I recognize these brands._

Branded across everything from mangled television screens to torn fast food bags were names and companies that had been shoved down my throat all my life. A burger joint I went too often when I needed a bite to eat, a T-shirt sharing a logo with the one I had been wearing this entire time, bikes, computers, toys, tools...the sight and smell overwhelmed me, made me recoil from some sort of culture shock. It was as if I were seeing Ebott for the first time again, even if it were still miles above me and whether or not I wanted to see it at all.

 _What is human trash doing here, anyway? Does it really flow into the Underground?_

 _Great. As if the monsters needed_ another _reason to hate mankind._

I scanned the pile for a flashlight, a lantern...hell, I'd even have taken a torch at that point, until the rancid smell grew so thick it repelled me like a bug spray to a mosquito. Finding something to chase away the blackness wasn't worth coughing up my own liver.

It turned out to be a good call. After taking more blind steps, a few patches of light managed to break their way through the cavern. Being able to see around myself was great, until I noticed it revealed nothing but the thick, slimy green shade of the water, and the additional clumps of trash being carried in on waterfalls from above. Seeing the new debris floating off in different directions made me realize how unnaturally constructed the stacks of trash were, built on a steady base with the lighter materials placed on top. Either the pit was treated as an actual landfill...

"...Or some OCD hobo is running around here, keeping the place spiffy," I said to myself. Instead of helping to lighten the mood, the low-effort joke only soured my spirits further.

The path forward turned a sharp corner and forced me into a narrower corridor with even less space between me and the filth. Any closer and I'd be unable to distinguish between the two of us.

A bright orange cooler in surprisingly good condition, at least compared to everything else, stuck out against the water like a big, bright, butt-ugly zit on a pale white face. I dug through it, pulling out a couple of those freeze-dried "space food" bars that serve no other purpose than to make you crave an actual ice cream sandwich. I never cared for them any of the times I had tried it. Felt like the equivalent of eating a dried out slice of watermelon over the real thing, but the wrapper had no brand that I recognized from the surface. Any monster food was welcome to take up residence in my pockets, at least until the next time I got the living shit kicked out of me.

My looting spree was cut short when I saw it. The rotten cherry on top of the trash heap. A worn, sullen training dummy falling apart at the seems, hiding with its back to the wall, staring blankly ahead as if something could attack at any moment. It wore old, tattered leather for skin that looked ready to tear apart at the slightest touch. Probably the only thing left to rot in the trash heap that didn't come from the surface, and it still managed to be painfully familiar.

I brought myself to eye-level with the dummy. While it saw nothing, I saw everything that was wrong with everything in that stare. I saw a tidal wave of places and names and emotions and voices and failures that crashed against my shoulders and sucked the air out from my lungs. No part of my brain could decipher why seeing it brought on so many memories. They just came.

 _We don't want to hurt anyone, do we...?_

My fist shot out and brushed the dummy's face. But that was all it was, a brush. The punch was shaky and unsure; it lacked any sort of drive or confidence, and worst of all, any purpose.

I clenched my teeth and hit the dummy again, harder. And again, harder. And again, and again, until I had to hold the dummy in place with my free hand just to keep it from falling over. And then I hit it harder. Each blow was filled to the breaking point with a fury that burst out over the dummy's leather like blood, and that breaking point was pushed further with each blow. Soon my eyes no longer laid sight on a simple punching bag, but on monsters, on Sans and Papyrus and Flowey especially, then humans, teachers and peers and officers. But more than anything else, the dummy manifested itself as a broken and beaten down Undyne screaming for the last moments of her life.

I kept hitting it mercilessly, until I realized the endeavor only added onto the burden _._ After letting that, along with the pain creeping through my knuckles, sink in, I gave the dummy one last shove. Its head bumped against the uneven surface of the wall a few times before it landed in the water with a faint splash.

"As for you, I can _happily_ label you a 'bastard.'" I wasn't all that far off, anyway. Isn't that all a punching bag becomes when you've had enough, a bastard child of every problem you wished you could solve with your fists?

I sighed, attempting to pull my rapid breaths back under control. _Should've expected to feel worse after losing myself like that again..._

What I couldn't have expected was the dummy shooting off the ground and butting into my nose in retaliation.

My hands went right to the spot where it had hit me, feeling something sticky seep between the gaps in my fingers. The dummy, meanwhile, was busy denying every thread of reality that had remained unsevered until now, levitating a few feet above the ground. Before I could fully recover, it darted across the surface of the water and blocked my only way forward.

"FOOL! You thought you could hurt ME?!" it bellowed, its head bobbing up and down with each ear piercing word.

"For Christ's sake, the _hell_ do you want?" I cried, taking my hands away from my face only to find them already stained a dark crimson. What was left of the blood in my body began to simmer as I glared at the disturbed figure in front of me.

The now animate dummy's thousand-yard stare had been overhauled for a gaze so full of anger and piercing enough to snipe a fly out of the air from a thousand yards away. Its body had appeared at least vaguely normal to me a moment ago, but the stitches holding it together had come loose, its fragmented pieces held together only by whatever force kept it airborne. Now that it was alive and moving so...unnaturally, as if the head were some kind of puppeteer and the rest of it the body parts of a marionette coerced into bending to its will...it sent chills down my spine.

"What do _I_ want?" it cackled, pulling the mess of torn leather and string it called a face into a twisted sneer. "I am the ghost that inhabitants this dummy!"

 _A ghost? Like the one in the Ruins?_ "Beat it, Frankenstein!" I had tried to sound intimidating, but my voice broke mid sentence. Now I wasn't sure if it was from a lack of confidence, or how my nose was undoubtedly smashed to a pulp.

"Frankenstein? Oh, that's rich, because _you're_ the only monster here!" It resumed it's cackling, until each part of its body eerily froze. "Well, technically speaking, you're the only _non_ -monster here...but IT MATTERS NOT!"

Its screams were so loud and erratic, I half-expected them to break the surface of the water. "Then what does matter?"

Once again, the dummy became completely motionless before it continued. "My cousin used to live inside a dummy, too. Until...YOU!"

 _Me._

"When you talked to them, they thought they were in for a nice chat. But the things you _said_...horrible, shocking, UNBELIEVABLE!"

 _Is he talking about that training dummy in the Ruins?_ "Pretty sure I said hello-"

"-It spooked them right out of their dummy!" At the last word, a chorus of whistles and explosions crescendoed to life from every direction. The sound and images of thick smoke appearing out of thin air reminded me of gunshot, and alone was enough to make me recoil. After the smog had cleared, an army of shimmering white dummies stacked and mangled together like tangled webbing was revealed, forming a tightly knit bubble around me and the clearly insane dummy. Nowhere to run. "HUMAN! I'LL SCARE YOUR SOUL OUT OF YOUR BODY!"

I wanted to puke. I wasn't ready for this, not so soon after healing off those injuries and receiving another blow to my nose. But what other option did I have?

Feeling the gaze of every single dummy burning through the skin on my back, I rushed forward with my tough glove draped across my hand and rammed it straight into the mad dummy's snout. Its head snapped backwards and tumbled clean off its shoulders, and everything else followed suite, until the whole thing lay in a motionless heap on the floor.

I blinked, not sure whether to be relieved or bewildered. "Um...talk about all bark and no bite?"

Sure enough, the broken pieces of the dummy began shaking violently after a couple seconds of staring. "Futile. Futile. FUTILE!" After emitting that muffled scream, they flew up and forced themselves back together, making an effort to push me back. I complied, putting enough space between us for me to unwrap and take a bite out of one of my space food bars, just enough to stem the bleeding from my nose. "You thought physical attacks could hurt me!? What are you, some kind of cheap, brainless _dummy_?!"

Before I could even begin to think of a retort, the dummies surrounding us began to open fire on me. Seeing them participate as anything more than glorified traffic cones startled me enough that the first shot almost scraped past my shoulder. At first, I thought the projectiles they hurled would come from every direction at once, eventually overwhelming me. But the shots they fired, appearing more like scribbles across a piece of paper than an actual attack, traveled at the lightning-fast speed of a snail with crutches. As if it weren't predictable enough, only a few of them would fire at a time, and all from the same direction. I quickly found that I barely even had to move to avoid being hit by them.

The moment their pebble assault ended, I attacked the mad dummy a second time, this time aiming lower on its body. The center most and largest part of its body went flying backwards, but boomeranged back into place almost instantly.

"Foolish. Foolish. FOOLISH!" The dummy laughed again. "You really must be brain dead! Even if you attack my vessel, you'll _never_ hurt me! I'm still incorporeal, you DUMMY!"

"Say dummy one more god damn time, I _dare_ you," I growled with a flex of my fist, but there wasn't much else I could do to enforce the threat aside from pounding him again, only to reform moments later.

 _Shit, is there really no way I can hurt him?_

It lowered its head so we were eye to eye. "Dummy."

His posse of reinforcements began firing for a second time, no more tricky to avoid than the last. But it didn't matter how pathetic their efforts were if there I was nothing I could do to the leader of the bunch. I tried plowing my way through the wall of them, receiving a nasty shock in response when my skin made contact with them. They weren't any more solid than wisps of vapor, but appeared to be made out of the same energy as the scribbles they shot at me. Eventually they would wear me down, and...

 _Dammit, why is it never that easy-_

"-Yowch!"

I spun to face the outburst, quickly covered up by the mad dummy, but not quick enough. I know what I had seen.

 _Bingo_.

Another wave of projectiles was hurled my way. Seeing my opportunity, I ducked under the floating form of the mad dummy, much to their confusion.

"Hey, what are you - OWWW!"

I smiled to myself. My theory was right. Every shot from one of his own men had hurt his "incorporeal" form in some way.

"You dummies!" cried out the dummy. "Watch where you're aiming your magic attacks!" Noticing the smirk spreading across my face, it added, "Hey, you! Forget anything I said about magic!"

"Gladly."

With that knowledge at my disposal, fighting the mad dummy became trivial. It was just a matter of waiting for his minions to fire and lining up the shots so that they collided with the flying sack of potatoes, which was trying its hardest to throw itself out of the line of fire, and failing miserably at it. Judging by how much its sorry excuse for a body flopped around when it jerked into motion, controlling its tangled mess of detached leather was more difficult than he made it out to be.

After about five rounds of being repeatedly pelted in the face, the dummy screeched, "HEY GUYS!" I stopped moving for a moment as every single dummy illusion poked their heads out to take orders from their master. "Dummies. Dummies. DUMMIES!"

"I'd do what he says, guys," I said. "Starting to think that squeal of his is giving me brain damage..."

His head spun to look at me. "You. Quiet." Then he addressed his men. "Remember how I said _not_ to shoot at me? Well...FAILURES!" I made an effort to cover my ears, but I was too slow. The mad dummy had finally succeeded in shattering my eardrums with his voice. His eyes were bulging out of his head, his body even more spastic than before. Even his men, which I'd been sure were illusions until now, looked scared shitless. "YOU'RE FIRED! YOU'RE ALL BEING REPLACED!"

At his command, the wall of dummies vanished in another puff of smoke, and were replaced by new ones before I could even begin to attempt an escape. Oddly enough, the sound of mechanical clicks and whirs filled the room with their absence, along with the maniacal laughter of my new least favorite thing to ever grace the planet.

"Now you'll see my true power: relying on people that aren't literal garbage!"

The air cleared, and I got a glimpse of the new dummy brigade, this time appearing much more organized, and...robotic.

"Uh..."

"DUMMY BOTS! MAGIC MISSILE!"

You ever had heat-seeking missiles - you know, the ones from just about every action movie ever made - fired directly at you in an enclosed space?

It's about as exciting as it sounds.

A cluster of the robo-dummies had opened fire on me, and I wasted no time moving to get as far away from the blast zone as possible. Unfortunately the missiles had a different idea; chase me down to every corner of the earth until I was reduced to a smoldering pile of ash, left only to be swept up by the water current. I ran them in circles for a few heart pounding seconds, until they lost track of me and went careening off into nowhere.

 _No explosion? Shit, that's right! They're not real missiles, probably the same as the weird scribbles the other dummies were firing..._

 _I wonder..._

"Dummy bots! Try again!"

More of them fired this time, but I wasn't complaining. If anything, it just meant I could wreak more havoc for the mad dummy himself. He had a tragic problem of hiring people who made his life a living hell, but I couldn't say I felt sorry for him.

I led the rockets around in a circle again, this time sprinting head first at the ringleader of the bunch once I finished the rotation. The mad dummy, refusing to learn his lesson, was too busy laughing to himself to notice the array of missiles headed towards him, until I was already sliding beneath the bottom of his airborne stand.

"Oh, NOT AGAIN!" he cried as his body was bombarded with the satisfying _boom_ of the rockets.

 _Now_ that's _what I call an explosion._

"No way!" panted the dummy, perturbed. "These guys are even _worse_ than the other guys!"

"Eh, about on par I'd say," I chimed in.

The mad dummy was not amused. "Who cares. Who cares! WHO CARES! I DON'T NEED FRIENDS!" For a final trick, he pulled out a knife from thin air. "I'VE GOT KNIVES!"

A paralyzing sense of shock injected itself into my blood stream, and my limbs froze for almost a second too long as he hurled the knife my way. At the last possible moment, I ducked under the dagger, which disappeared into the murky shallows. "Christ, dude, chill out!"

"CHILL OUT?! I'll have you know that I...I...I'm...out of knives." The room appeared to tremble when he spoke again. "BUT IT DOESN'T MATTER! YOU CAN'T HURT ME AND I CAN'T HURT YOU!"

 _Dammit, he's right. I don't have anything to hit him with..._

His eyes appeared ready to gut me from the inside out. "YOU'LL BE STUCK FIGHTING ME...forever. Forever! FOREVER!"

And that shrill, gravelly, insane laughter echoed throughout the cavern, drowning out any and all sane thoughts I could still muster.

But it only lasted a moment. In what was the probably the luckiest moment that will ever occur in my entire life, I was saved. Not intentionally, not by a person. By just a little bit of acid rain.

The droplets came out of seemingly nowhere aside from above, falling straight down onto the dummy's head. It flinched with every drop, disgust spreading across its face. "Wh-what the heck is this? Acid rain?!"

I moved out of the way of a few stray drops, trying to hide both my confusion and optimism at the sudden turn of events. "Apparently."

"Oh, forget it! I'm outta here!" Just like that, defeated by nothing but himself, the incredibly pissed off dummy's minions vanished as he flew over my head and straight out of the trash pit. Leaving me with my rapidly crashing adrenaline levels.

I let out an exhausted breath, biting my lip to fight the temptation of dropping to the ground and sleeping 'till I couldn't get back up. Even though the cuts and bends and breaks were healed, I could still feel the agony I was in only minutes ago. They were mental scars, now. Voices in my head urging me to give up. Fighting had taken my mind away from them, but like the effects of a placebo, it only lasted momentarily.

What would happen if I encountered someone actually worth a damn? Could I trust myself to keep pushing? Did I _want_ to keep pushing?

 _What am I even pushing for? Even if I make it back to the surface, what would I say to anyone? They'll probably think I'm insane. They'll lock me away, keep me hidden from the world._

 _I can't do this anymore. I want to go home..._

 _...But where is home?_

"...Sorry, I interrupted you, didn't I?"

I glanced up at the soft, unsure voice, a nice relief after listening to that dummy scream his head off. A new figure floated in front of me, one that looked strangely familiar. Another ghost from the look of it, half transparent, had a Charlie Brown Halloween costume look to him, tears drifting down his face...

...Acid tears...

"...Grey? I mean...shit what was you name again?"

The ghost was so absorbed in self-loathing, he hadn't heard me. But I was sure this was the ghost from way back in the Ruins.

"As soon I came over, your friend immediately left..."

 _Napstablook!_

"That's your name, right? Napstablook?"

He turned his vacant stare on me, immediately turning away. "Y-yeah. You remembered? Wow."

"Talk about a blast from the past. It feels like I haven't seen you in forever."

"I-I'm sorry I interrupted you guys...you looked like you were having fun..."

I frowned. "You think him mercilessly trying to kill me looked like fun?"

"Oh no...I just wanted to say hi..."

Whether he was embarrassed or just confused, I had no idea. Either way, he had started to float down the path forward, rapidly putting distance between us.

"Hey, wait up!" I began to chase after him, grateful to leave the stench of muck and trash behind me.


	23. Chapter 23: Healing

The reek of the junk pit clung to my clothing and followed me as I pursued Napstablook, who was either hardwired to believe he had somehow embarrassed himself by chasing away the mad dummy, or desperately needing an excuse to avoid me. Maybe ghosts still carried their sense of smell in the sort-of-afterlife, and that's why he felt the need to distance himself so quickly. Either way, I wasn't about to let Grey slip away. Traveling with that monster kid must've made me soft, 'cause I had no intention of pressing onward alone. Or without at least chatting up one of about three people who wasn't actively looking forward to slaughtering me.

"Grey, do I need to run around wearing a friggin' billboard or something? WAIT UP!"

That finally got the self-loathing ghost's attention. He slowed to a halt and turned warily to face me, and I stopped a few paces in front of him, panting. "Huh? Are you not still mad at me?"

 _Goddamn, even when I'm not angry with people they think I look pissed._ "Dude, I'd need a reason to be mad the first time for there to be a 'still.'"

He cocked his head to the side, giving me a stare more clueless than a detective stuck at square one. "But I thought..."

"Don't really give a damn about what you _thought_ just happened. That freak and I weren't screwing around all buddy-buddy, he was trying to slaughter me!"

A faint look of realization broke across his face. "O-oh. Sorry about that..."

I frowned. "Why are you sorry? You're the one who got me out of that mess, with those badass acid tears of yours."

"I-I did?"

"Yep."

"Oh."

 _'Oh' indeed._ "So yeah. Bottom line is, I'm not mad at you." _Just everyone else. Consider yourself lucky.  
_

"Okay."

With the largest elephant in the room addressed, Grey and I quickly ran out of things to talk about, leaving a heavy, dead silence hanging between us like a corpse. He bobbed up and down absentmindedly, slowly drifting away as if being carried by some invisible current, refusing to make eye contact with anything but the floor. While he was silently willing himself to disappear, I was silently willing my brain to stop screaming useless thoughts and commands from in my head. Fighting the urges that I had nearly surrendered to moments before.

"...My house is just up ahead, not like you'd want to stop over..." Grey said at last, just as the rhythmic tapping of my own feet had begun to drive me insane. "...Just thought I'd offer..."

"Uh...sure," I replied with equal confidence, my own voice surprising me. "Guess I've got nothing better to do right now." _Aside from dying, of course._

Grey acted beyond surprised to hear me agree to follow him. "O-oh, seriously?" I nodded, and his face lit up. "Alright...follow me then..."

"Lead the way, airhead."

We didn't have to go very far, only a few paces from where we started. I figured a house crammed into a close-quarters cave like this would be like an animal making its home out of a shallow hole in a tree, a pretty pathetic image in my mind.

 _Couldn't have been more right._

Grey's house was begging for some destructive force to come put it out of its own misery. It was embarrassingly small, but stood so close against the low hanging ceiling that it almost appeared tall, having to slouch over just to avoid scraping it, as if hanging its head in misery of its own incompetence. There was only a single round window and one door gracing its cracked, chaffing, sickly blue surface, and the rest was left barren. Pathetic was the only word I could use to describe it. A pathetic excuse for a place to call home.

 _And still pretty damn impressive for a ghost. Why does he even need a door?  
_

The only thing I could compliment was the lack of any annoying company, with only one neighboring house, left in an even sorrier state. Nearly identical aside from its pink color, it appeared as vacant as the space inside Papyrus' skull, its window shattered with no light coming from inside. Ironically, it seemed more fit to be the living quarters of a ghost.

"At least you don't have to deal with any annoying neighbors, right?" I asked Grey, but he had already moved inside the slightly more inhabitable home. I stopped outside and rested my hand on the worn brass doorknob for a minute, debating whether or not it was actually worth entering. _Eh, I've seen worse in the ghetto, anyways._

As if it were even possible, the inside of Grey's humble abode was in even worse condition than the outside. I had to watch my step just to avoid falling through the splintering wood floor, which was left nearly in shambles. There was only one lonely room to make up the entire property, and half of it was empty space, anyway. A fridge, TV set that looked like it was ripped straight from the nineties, and a desktop computer more ancient than the grime-covered cobwebs lining the corners of the wall took up the other half. As I took a few steps into the foyer, the musky sent of Grey's lovely abode infiltrated my senses, I choked on a sharp inhale of dust, and the lack of any bathroom made me realize for the first time how badly I had to take a leak.

 _God damn, I think I've been holding it since the first fall..._

"Oh, you really came..." Grey's voice floated over, and I noticed him for the first time hovering over his cluttered desktop with a pair of headphones strung over his head. I didn't bother asking for any explanation as to how he kept them on, or the seemingly infinite pile of CD cases sitting beside his computer. "Sorry, I...wasn't expecting that."

"And miss hanging out at such a...sick pad like this one? Like I said, don't have anything better do, anyway." I fought the unwavering, powerful urges of my bladder to leave, knowing that ditching Grey at this point would probably shatter any fiber of spirit he had left in him for good. "So...whaddya do around here?" _When you're not self-loathing, that is._

"W-well...I guess, well sometimes I...you know..."

"Take your sweet time, Grey, I'll just sit here collecting dust," I said, making my way over to the ghost. His monitor was on (honestly, I was surprised the damn thing could still run at all) displaying what seemed to be...some sort of music sharing website. _That explains the mountain of CDs on his desk.  
_

Grey recoiled at my comment as if getting slugged across the face...if that were even possible. He turned away and started shaking uncontrollably, letting out disheveled moans under his breath.

"Dude, c'mon," I rolled my eyes, having regretted opening my mouth at all. Talking to Napstablook was like balancing a balloon on the tip of a needle, where the slightest provocation tipped him off balance and threatened to pop him. _I'll have to be careful what I say to him..._

 _...What am I still doing here, again?_

"S-sorry...not used to company, is all," Grey stuttered, regaining about as much of his composure as he began with.

"I take it you've got a thing for music?" I tentatively plucked the top CD from the pile, but no amount of fidelity could've save the next twenty or so from toppling to the floor like a Jenga tower. "Uh...I'll pick those up later."

Napstablook sighed. "I-it's fine, I'll get them when you leave...just watch your step."

I nodded awkwardly, taking a peek at the label taped across the CD cover. It read "spooktunes," exactly what you would expect a ghost would listen too. "A classic spooktune...they don't make songs like this anymore," Grey whispered over my shoulder. I noticed the disk drive of his computer was already open, as if it had been waiting for me to pop in the CD since I had arrived.

"Guess it couldn't be that...bad." I tentatively slid the disk into place and closed the drive.

 _What the living hell is this sorry excuse for white noise assaulting my eardrums?_

The notes chugging out of the already muffled speakers on Grey's computer sounded as though they had already been torn and gutted like a wounded animal, left to rot in a puddle of their own blood, now begging for the release of death. Only one "instrument" accompanied the silence, something that sounded along the lines of an auto tuned fart, looping the same two measures on what sounded like an infinite loop. With no variation, the song droned on, like a dog chasing its own tail. Every second I stood there, mind gone blank, feeling the skin of my face steadily pinch tighter and tighter together in disgust, was another second I realized how perfectly the song complemented the tone of the house.

"Thank god they don't make songs like this anymore. I'd even take the top hundred chart over this..." I muttered, not really caring whether Grey could hear me or not. It didn't look like that would be an issue, since he seemed totally lost in the spooktunes. An almost tranquil expression had taken over his face, as if he were relaxing in a hot spring, and not listening to the most unfortunate sequence of sounds ever strung together. His eyes were closed, so I didn't bother to hide my smirk. "Guess everyone has their own tastes. And some people get a kick out of eating shit."

I decided to let the song play for another minute or so, to commemorate the first time I had ever seen Napstablook taking a fraction of a second to worry about something other than whatever mistake he had made moments before. Then I reached over and peeled one of the ear muffs off his head, finding it was solid. "You got a bathroom around here, Grey?"

He blinked. "A...bath...room-"

"Never mind," I interjected, wandering as far away from the computer, and spooktunes, as possible.

A moment later, Grey snickered at me, out of all the things he could've done. "...Why would a ghost need a bathroom...?"

"Look, I don't know every single rule of ghosthood, or whatever!" I worried my slight overreaction would push Grey back into an over apologetic state, but he only flinched a little, keeping the small smile. "You _clearly_ have a fridge, meaning that you must eat something. Has to come out somewhere."

"...Actually, that fridge hasn't been plugged in for a long time," Grey explained, cracking a small smile. "I just haven't had the time to get rid of it. Nothing but... _ghost_ sandwiches in there now..."

I stared at him as if he had suddenly grown a pair of arms. "Was that a joke? From you, Grey?"

"...I-I dunno, did it really sound like one?"

That nearly got me bent over laughing, a sound I doubted had ever graced the confines of Grey's home. Even he joined in with a giggle or two. "I knew you'd come around."

He shrank away, just a little bit, at the encouragement. "I-I guess it beats lying on the ground and feeling like garbage."

We stood around listening to the ear-bleedingly bad spook tunes for longer than my remaining sanity would allow, until I carefully asked Grey if there were literally anything else we could be doing. He thought about it for a second, deciding he wanted to show me something, then led me out from the dusty old house and back into the older, dustier caverns outside. We kept moving a short way past the decrepit neighboring house, until Grey came to a stop in front of a rickety fence that barely came up above my shins.

"Welcome to the Blook family snail farm," Grey announced with as much enthusiasm as he could muster.

I couldn't blame him. Even "farm" was too glorious a title for the ten square feet of fence holding in its captives, a mere three snails total. The first was normal, a bleak brown shell sitting on top of a little slime ball. The middle snail had a long nose that stuck out awkwardly from its faceless features, and it was the only one to turn what I assumed to be its head towards us as we stared. The last one was missing its shell and had shriveled up like a prune in the sun.

"It's...uh...it's certainly a thing that exists," I said, leaning a little too hard on the fence that could only keep a snail in check. The damn thing nearly cracked like a piece of driftwood.

"...Yeah, it's seen better days." Napstablook looked vacantly out over the pitiful display and let out a sigh. "I'm the only employee left anymore. This place used to get a lot of business...but our main customer disappeared one day, now it's just some hairy guy that shows up once a month..."

"You said 'family'..."

"H-Huh?!"

I could've sworn the long-nosed snail had tilted its head curiously at Grey's surprise. "You said 'family' farm, but...I'm not seeing anyone else around."

"Uh...well...see...uh...yeah...that...hmm..."

"You ever heard of the saying, 'I just don't want to talk about it?'" I asked, shrugging. "It's fine man, I don't care to chat about my family, either."

"Oh. Okay." Another awkward silence manifested itself while the snails slithered around in their own slime, an act almost as exciting as watching paint dry. I wondered how Napstablook could tolerate living in a place like this, alone, with nothing but a few salty old snails to keep as company. _Unless that's what he prefers. Needing to escape from the world for awhile, I get, but staying this isolated, a short stroll away from a massive trash-heap? Why bother existing at all...  
_

"Do you want to play a game?" the ghost asked quietly, sounding bored of his own snail farm.

I frowned at the suggestion. "Depends on what you had in mind. I'll pass if it's checkers."

Grey floated further down the path headed behind the initial pen up to an identical looking fence that I had neglected to notice before. The only differences were its contents: three new snails - one red, one yellow, and one blue - that appeared a lot more lively than the other set, and a black and white checkerboard pattern that ran across the ground on either end of the pen. "What, are the snails driving go-karts?"

"It's called Thundersnail," Grey began. "The snails race, and if the yellow snail wins, you win. It's ten gold to play."

"So let me get this straight...for your dying family business, you put the ugly old snails front and center on the property, and swept the exciting part that could actually turn a profit under the table like a moldy sandwich?" I inquired. I meant it as more of a suggestion than a hostility, but knowing Grey, I figured it wouldn't matter to him. Whatever the intention, it was almost guaranteed he would take it the wrong way.

"O-oh, yeah, you're right. I should...maybe...fix that..."

 _Well never mind, then._

"Whatever, I'll play. Assuming my life insurance funds will allow it." I pulled out of a couple of gold coins from my back pocket, immediately recognizing how stupid it was to waste money on some back-alley carnival game, but handed them over to Grey anyway. The prospect of winning more money in return for my bet was too good to pass up, and my chances were guaranteed to be at least one in three. _Pretty good odds. Can't wait to watch those hopes shatter into a million fragments._

Grey took the coins, by which I mean they floated awkwardly to the center of his body and...just sort of hung out there, then turned his attention to the race course. "Remember, you're rooting for the yellow snail," he reminded me. "The trick is to give her _just_ enough encouragement to win."

I smirked at him. "Givin' me advice? Shouldn't you want me to lose?" He stared back at me blankly. "You know, so you can...keep the money?" No reaction.

"Why would I want my friend to lose?"

 _Please don't do this to me._ "N-no reason. Lets start the race," I insisted, throwing my hands over the fence, more gently than before to keep it from crashing to the ground. The three snails willingly took their places without even the slightest hesitation, proof that Napstablook had at least some vague idea of what he was doing with his snail farm business. I peered closely at the competitors, then the course itself, scanning for some kind of hidden advantage that could push the yellow snail to victory, but the track stayed completely level throughout, and each snail appeared identical aside from their colors. _So this really is a total crap-shoot. How the hell would a snail even notice it's being cheered on?_

"Three..." read Napstablook, with about as much enthusiasm as an underpaid, part time employee at a fast food "restaurant." I curled my arms under my chin and rested myself over the edge of the fence lazily, prepared for a long waste of time. "Two...One...Go..."

At the oddly fitting unenthusiastic introduction, the snails took off at the lightning fast speed of a glob of molasses rolling down the side of a frying pan. The gnawing pace of the competition accompanied by the lack of any audience sucked any excitement from the air like a wet sponge. I had only been watching for about ten seconds before I felt my interest fading, even though Grey seemed totally content watching them shuffle along the ground, leaving a thin trail of slime behind them.

 _Should've called this game Blundersnail._ It wasn't until I noticed the yellow snail beginning to fall behind that I remembered my bet.

"C'mon, pick up the pace," I murmured through my teeth, lifting my head up. The snail peered over at me for a brief moment, as if it could understand my urges, and began moving again with a little more hustle. That didn't stop the red snail from pulling even further out in front of the pack. _Did Grey rig the damn bet?_ "Move, dammit!"

My runner put its full attention on me, the slime dripping down its body glistening like a nervous sweat. I narrowed my eyebrows, slapping the fence in frustration and gesturing wildly towards the finish line with other hand. "What, are you on break or something? I've seen three-legged turtles go faster than you!"

That got the dignified slug chugging along at a better pace, but the effort proved too little too late. Even as it overtook its blue equivalent, the red snail remained so far ahead that the competition meant next to nothing. Although I had thought I accepted the very possible outcome of throwing my money away, hot blood began to flush in my cheeks anyway. "Finish line's dead ahead, asshole!"

Instead of motivating itself to go any further, my last comment made the snail pull back into its shell and roll over on its side in dirt and defeat. I sighed as the front runner crossed the finish line, noticing Napstablook's wide-eyed look of genuine concern for the first time. "You...you can have your money back, if you want..."

"No, it's alright, really," I insisted, unable to quell the remaining anger in my voice. I sucked in a deep breath and took another look around at the dusty surroundings. _He could probably use the cash more anyway._

"...No, I think you should take it back." Grey offered the coins to me for a second time. "You would use it better..."

"I lost fair and square, Grey. The money's yours."

"But-"

"-Just take it, you're farm's already gone to shit. Rejecting profits is the dumbest thing you could do, airhead."

That left Grey very quiet for a few moments, as the snails struggled back to their starting positions like a fat man struggling through a revolving door. I was sure I had won the argument, that I had convinced the ghost to accept the coin he had earned himself.

Until he forced the coins out from his wisp of a body, letting them drop on the floor with a series of heavy _clangs_. "But I don't want you to die."

His words spilled over me like a river of blood - thick, warm, and sickening. The track and the farm and the ghost disappeared, vanished into thin air, and I was left totally alone. I lay on the ground, unarmed and defenseless, the only sound my heart beating in my ears, matched with heavy footsteps, drawing closer. Louder and closer. My body convulsed and shook rapidly, a leaf caught in a hurricane, but refused to move. Each limb felt heavy and broken, crying out for help. Moments that felt like hours passed, and a spear point tore through the center of my chest, easily as a knife through paper.

 _But at least someone will care._

I blinked the thought away, and I was back by the racetrack with Napstablook, as if nothing had changed at all. Everything seemed more blurry than before, shimmering as if underwater, and something wet was dripping down the side of my cheek, a mystery that wasn't all that hard to solve.

"I-I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you cry..." Grey whined.

I smeared the tear across my sleeve. "I don't cry," I said, even with the proof of droplets that remained on my face, and the uncertainty hiding in my voice.

Grey hung his head low. "Are you scared? Is that why you decided to waste your time here with me?"

 _Damn._ "...Guess you've got me all figured out, Grey." I thought back to that horrid night, overlooking Ebott City, leaning over the pit that was supposed to rip me from all my troubles. "God, I thought I was ready..." I continued, biting back a sob. My instincts told me to quit, there was no need to force my heavy baggage onto Grey's shoulders, but like a ball rolling off a cliff, I couldn't stop. "I thought I wanted it to end. God dammit, Grey, I was so damn stupid..."

An uneasiness bubbled between the two of us, accompanying the feeling in my stomach perfectly. I shuddered, pulling my arms to my chest, wishing I could vanish as easily as the spirit floating before me. _Why am I telling him all of this? What the hell am I even doing here?  
_

"I-I've never been very good at pep talks, but...I'll give it a shot," Napstablook interrupted the silence. I glanced up at him, refusing to move, as he turned his gaze away from me, as if the words he were looking for would be engraved in the stone beside him. "When we first met...i-in the Ruins, y-you...you had this, uh, this _look_ , in your eye, this...spark."

I stared at Grey, now curious to see where he was going with his speech. "I-I, hadn't seen anything like it, in anyone. Not for a long time, anyway..." He spun towards me, eyes wide with excitement. "B-but it was there! I tried to ignore it...I-I had wanted you to leave me alone...until we started talking. The way you spoke and held yourself, plus that spark in your eye...it made me feel like nothing could ever stop you. That no pain, no matter how intense, could drag you to a halt." He nodded to my dumbfounded form. "And I think you've felt that too, you've just forgotten it. If...um...if that makes any sense."

His words churned in my head, only serving to confuse me at first. Slowly but surely, though, they began to fit snugly into place, becoming the sole thing that had made sense to me in the longest time. Working as if on their own accord, my hands dug through my pockets until they wrapped around something small and smooth. I pulled it out, finding myself staring at the jar that held the snowman piece given to me...forever ago. Despite the journey I had made, with more than a few small bumps in the road, the glass held a sturdy and polished composure, but what really caught my eye were its contents. Every single glistening white crystal was as it had been all that time ago, in flawless condition, unperturbed by the hardships they had faced. _So persistent..._

A word popped into my mind. A very familiar word, yet it felt somehow distant, almost a dream. _Determination._

"Thanks, Napstablook," I said, heaving out a breath of...something. Relief? Anxiety? I didn't know, and was frankly far past the point of caring. I narrowed my eyes, wiped the last remnants of my tears from my face, replaced the jar in my pocket, cracked my knuckles, and looked up at the ghost. "If that's everything, then I'll be on my merry little way. 'Bout to go roll some damn heads."

Grey smiled. "There's that spark." He hesitated for a moment. "H-hey...if you're ever in the area again, there's this...show I like to watch. We should...er, we could-"

"-Definitely," I nodded, even though I was confident I wouldn't be coming back. The idea of waving the ghost behind for good weighed on me as I turned to leave, but I knew staying around Waterfall wasn't an option. At some point or another, I would have to confront Undyne head-on. And more likely than not, only one of us would be able to leave alive. _Whatever happens, I'm through with running._

A few moments later and I had set out on a path away from Napstablook's farm, a new feeling rippling in my chest and motivating the rest of my body forward, each step carrying myself further than the last.

"H-hey! You forgot to take the gold back!" I heard him call out.

I looked over my shoulder at him and smiled. "Don't need it."


	24. Chapter 24: Pursuit

_At least I can be the first person to say they'd taken a piss in a monster's landfill miles below ground...impressive I guess, but not exactly a great conversation starter._

Having taken a moment to relieve myself in the junk pit, figuring nothing could make the stench any more unbearable, I was quickly back wallowing through the winding, claustrophobic Waterfall caves. My only company left were the "weapons" by my side and the food in my pockets, but I didn't feel so alone anymore. The anticipation of encountering Undyne had fizzled to less of an iron grip on my gut and more of a nervous buzzing that urged me ahead, the kind you might get performing for a live audience. Fairly high spirits by my standards. There was only one problem...well, only one out of an ocean of problems swimming in my thoughts, but this inconvenience had taken the forefront of my attention.

"Where the hell am I going?"

There had been only one path that I could find leading away from the quiet of Grey's house, an adit held open by rotting boards of wood that shouldn't have been supporting the walls of a dollhouse, let alone a massive chunk of dense rock. My options were limited, though, so I gave the boards a good kick to ensure they wouldn't cave in on me and hurried through the opening. The cavern inside was dusty and cramped as any other in Waterfall, but this one was filled to the brim glittering blue and pink gemstones, poking out of every surface like patches of light reflecting off the surface of the sea, brightening up the room dramatically. Impressive at first, but passing by the same stones over and over again while squandering around the same room for ten solid minutes searching for a way forward, the effect began to wear on me. None of the gems would so much as budge when I tugged on them, adding to the numbing frustration.

My vain efforts were interrupted by a loud, ragged cackle echoing off of every wall, as if mocking me from all directions. "What's so funny?" I challenged, whipping around to find the voice. _To be fair, you did just attempt to tear a sapphire lodged in the cave wall out with your bare hands._

I couldn't place it at first. Everything seemed just as empty and devoid of life as it had before, but the laughter wouldn't stop. Finally, a head popped out from behind one of the many rocks, a single wide yellow eye staring directly at me. "Oh, oh, please," the newcomer started, wiping at his eye as though it were tearing up. _Even though he clearly isn't._ "Don't let me distract you, by all means, keep pulling!" He continued laughing, quieter now, and shuffled out from behind his hiding spot like a crippled rat.

I furrowed my brow at the stranger, who appeared far too old for his own good. Wrinkled, spotted and pasty green skin, a charming vomit color, stretched like an old, dried string of taffy around his ancient bones, tugging at the corners of his near toothless mouth with every movement, every sound that squirmed out of it. His appearance resembled something like a turtle, the cracked shell on his back being the giveaway, but he moved along at a decent pace despite this and the fact that his legs seemed to withered and skinny to hold him. "See what good it gets you," he mumbled, waving around the magnifying glass in his hand as if it were anything close to intimidating.

"Who asked you, old timer?" I fired back, edging the slightest bit away from the geezer. He didn't seem much of a threat to anything besides himself, but I didn't see much harm in being a little too careful.

His response was another fit of ragged laughter, as if his lungs were caving in from the effort. "First visitor I get in years, figures they..." His ranting continued under his breath, probably not something I would've wanted to hear, anyway.

I watched him saunter over to a spot particularly dense with the crystals, straighten the tan pith helmet wobbling on the top of his head, and bend over with the magnifying class pressed against the only eye he ever seemed to open. After a few seconds of staring and licking at his dried lips, he pretended to forget about my presence altogether.

"You uh...You a miner or something?" I asked, noting the helmet and the tan coat pulled around him.

"Mining!?" He looked up suddenly, an unsettling toothless smile growing on his face. "Oh, there haven't been people mining here for an eternity! When they first discovered these here stones, we figured they must be worth a fortune! Give it a couple years, and...turns out...they're everywhere." He sighed. "Absolutely worthless, these gems. Absolutely worthless...unless yer looking to craft one of those fancy friendship bracelets I see them kids wearing nowadays."

Some of the glimmer appeared to fade from the gems. "Oh." _Figures. At least the old coot saved me the trouble of yanking at these gems for the next ten minutes._ "So if they're not worth anything, the hell are you doing here?"

"Whatsit look like I'm doing here?!" he spat, not bothering to look up at me. _Or wipe the saliva off his magnifying glass._ "Name's Gerson. I'm studying the history of these here caves. Ain't so hard when you've lived through most of it yourself," he chuckled to himself, a nostalgic stare glazing over his eyes.

"Guess I have no grounds to argue with that." I smirked at him. "Tell me, what was it like living around dinosaurs like yourself?"

Gerson turned his magnified eye on me, pulsing eerily behind the glass. "Not nearly as exciting as it sounds. Those guys were real jerks, you know," he replied nonchalantly before turning back to his "work."

I scowled at the back of the old timer's bald, dried up, helmet-covered scalp, then moved to pass him and make another rotation around the room. _Just ask him where to go. Worst he can do is make you look like an even bigger idiot._ Even as the thought crossed my mind, though, my gaze drifted over something I had stupidly missed before, too fixated on finding a way out. I narrowed my eyes and started to make my way towards the oddity, a series of dark markings carved into the far wall. A perfect circle with a set of shapes resembling wings branching out from either side, hanging over a set of three small triangles...

"It's that weird symbol again," I muttered, recognizing it from the doors of the Ruins, hanging on the houses of monsters in Snowdin, even displayed proudly on the front of Tori's robe, now that I thought about it. "Hey old-timer," I raised my voice, not taking my eyes off the symbols. "Mind explaining to me what this _thing_ is? Feels like it's following me everywhere I go."

"Eh?" He squinted his crusty eyes, first at the symbol, then pointed them directly at me in apparent disbelief. "You don't know what that is?!"

"Not just asking for the hell of it..."

He shook his head and tucked his magnifying class back into his shirt pocket, hobbling over to me faster than those stubby legs should've carried him. "The hell are they teaching you kids in school..." Despite his complaining, a hint of a smile seem to creep across his face. _What, so lonely that_ this _is exciting for you?_ "That's the Delta Rune, emblem of our kingdom. The Kingdom of Monsters. Ever heard of it?"

I settled myself on one of the jagged rocks jutting out of the ground, preparing for an unnecessarily tedious explanation. "Suppose I might have somewhere, although I can't seem to recall."

Gerson caught on to the sarcasm in my voice and snickered. "Then your memory must be even worse than mine." Another sigh whistled through his yellow teeth. "The emblem's original meaning has been lost to time. All we know," his voice had turned to little more than a murmur, "is that the triangles symbolizes us monsters below, and the winged circle above symbolizes...something else."

I clicked my tongue. "Riveting."

He shot me a glare that would've made even the most timid person on the planet bend over in laughter. "Hey, which one of us wasit askin' in the first place?!"

I had already gathered a comeback or two, but stopped them on their way out. _Shouldn't risk having him hate me more than he already does, otherwise he might not finish his story. Or more importantly, tell me where the hell I'm going._ "Sorry." I nodded at the symbol. "So what does the rest mean?" _Unless you forgot all that, too._

"Well, if you had let me finish," he continued, cooling down a bit, "I would've told you that most people say that circle represents the 'angel,' from the prophecy."

 _Angel. Prophecy. More senseless bullshit, then. Suddenly I regret asking..._

But we had both settled in for the long haul by then, each snug in our own dull, hard earthy chairs. Gramps, at least, seemed more into his speech than before, stretching out his arms and fingers as if telling a corny campfire story. _This isn't a corny campfire story, right?_

"Legend has it, an 'angel' who has seen the surface will descend and from above and bring us freedom." His tired eyes fell over the symbol, a shadow cast over his scrunched up face that only highlighted the lines of age. "Lately, though, the people have been taking a...bleaker outlook. Callin' that winged circle the 'Angel of Death.' A harbinger of destruction, waitin' to free us from this mortal realm..." He cleared his throat. "When I see that circle...I just think it looks neat!"

I shrugged. Neither version of the tale hardly meant anything to me, just more useless information to sift through in the future. _At least that 'harbinger of destruction' one would've made for an interesting story_. "Well, y-" I bit my tongue. "...Er, _we_ shouldn't have anything to worry about. All that angel crap is horse shit anyway."

The old coot gave me a big, toothy grin with his half rotted teeth. "Easy for you to say, eh, human?" He must've noticed me pause mid breath, and chuckled to himself. "You didn't think you were that slick, did you now?"

"I-"

"-Oh, relax," he waved me off. "I've got no reason to go babbling to anyone, anyhow. Don't got much time left to enjoy the slaughter of humans," he assured me, hopping up from his seat and returning his magnifying glass to his hand. "While we're on the topic o' horse shit, when was the last time you've had a bath? Just breathing in your foul stench feels like its rotting whatever's left of me."

I thought about it for a moment, then smirked at the old timer. _Old bastard's not as_ _bad as I thought._ "If you're really curious, I had a little run in with Undyne, and ended up in that junk pit a little ways back." My heart skipped a beat at the memory, but I ignored it. "Been searching for a way out of Waterfall and wound up here. Any idea where I'm going?"

"Depends, you headed to the Capital or Snowdin? I'm assuming the Capital, since yer probably not lookin' to go sightseeing with yer life on the line." He lifted a bony finger towards the opening I'd come in from. "Head out there and take a left, opposite the way you came from the junk pit. Should be a liiiitle opening in the rocks you can squeeze through, and you're all set. Not surprised you missed it in the first place."

I nodded my thanks and hopped up from my perch on the rock. "Maybe I'll see you around, old timer, if ya live that long."

"Reassurin' to know I got nothin' good to live for. And you be careful out there, kid." Gerson lowered his voice to a whisper. "I shouldn't be telling you this, but Undyne came through here not too long ago, askin' bout someone who looked just like you. Shame for someone young as you to meet an end like that."

 _That means she hasn't given up the chase, or left me for dead. There goes any element of surprise I had..._ "I'll watch my back. And if she comes by here again, tell her I'm looking forward to our reunion."

"I might think to mention it." I heard him scoff under his breath just as I had disappeared from his sight. "Kids these days. Always lookin' for trouble wherever they can find it..."

* * *

Gerson hadn't been lying. A thin crack spread across the rock face exactly where he'd said, barely enough space to sidle through, and hardly very comfortable. I earned a couple new scratches from the experience, but nothing a nibble or two out of my space food bar couldn't patch up. The other side of the crack boasted a near identical hallway to the last thousand or so I'd traversed, barren aside from a series of plaques lining one side. I approached the first one, eyeing it cautiously. _More history lessons. Between these and the old man, it feels like I'm back home, trapped at school._ I took a deep breath and clenched my hands together before I began reading, not wanting to lose myself like the last time.

 **Bloodied, beaten, and fearful for the lives that remained, we surrendered to the humans. Seven of their most powerful mages sealed us underground with a curse.**

 _Human mages? What, we just forgot we could conjure fireballs at will and phased it out of history?  
_

 **Anything could enter through the seal as it pleased, but only beings with a most powerful soul could leave.**

"Damn." I found my hand drifting towards the heart floating by my chest, gripping at it as though it were solid. "You damn well better be strong enough," I said, moving to the next plaque. _They never do come in singles_. A few flecks of what I assumed was pollen from some nearby echo flowers drifted through the air aimlessly, something else to focus on along with the nearby murmurs of moving water, keeping me in reality.

 **There is only one way to reverse the spell, in theory. If some huge power, equivalent to seven human souls, attacked the barrier, it would be destroyed.**

 **But this cursed place has naught an entrance nor exit. There is no way a human could come here. We will remain trapped down here forever.**

 _But I got here._ My mind began working faster than I could process the thoughts. _And if Toriel wasn't lying, others have too. How many souls do they have already? Two? Three?  
_

 _Six?_

I shook the very idea away, but it stayed clinging to the edges of my consciousness. _Who cares. Nothing's changed, it's still you against the world. The stakes are just a little higher._ I sighed. If only things were that simple. _A thin paper shield between some bloodthirsty monsters and the entire human race. That's what I am._ For the first time, the situation seemed impossibly bigger than just myself.

I swallowed my spit and stalked away from the plaque, concentrating instead on what I would say to Undyne at our next and final confrontation. _It's still you against the world._ _I won't crumple for them.  
_

The cavern grew dim again as I progressed further, to the point where even the next step became something borderline treacherous. I ended up relying on the wavering blue glow of the fungi growing out of whatever tiny crevice they could find. A new type of mushroom with a much longer stalk, almost resembling a tree, helped to light the otherwise pitch black path. I had almost hoped for some monster encounters along the way to practice on before the strong, stoic, stick-up-her-ass Undyne, but none made an appearance. _The one time I'd want them to._

Before long, the fungus started disappearing, and the corridor was bathed in shadows. Shadows that might have held secrets if the path weren't so narrow. I stumbled about in the dark with an invisible scowl on my face, making far too much noise for my liking. It was quickly made worse when my foot met with nothing but open air and freezing water, the rest of my body quickly following suit. The cold swept over me like an icy gust of wind as I was nearly submerged in knee-high water, thrashing, sputtering curses and generally making enough noise to alert anything with a pair of ears and an attention span longer than three seconds in all of waterfall. _So much for drying off,_ I thought bitterly once back on solid ground, clothes soaked through to my skin and myself totally disoriented. _Or taking a stealthy approach. Not as if that were ever my style..._

With the added weight of damp clothing dragging me down and the chilled numbness coursing through my legs like an antidepressant, making any sort of progress became twice as difficult, and the black, empty, silent nothingness enveloping everything did little to encourage them forward. Assuming I was still headed in the right direction at all, if there even existed a 'right' direction anymore. My hand brushed past what felt like a thicket of leaves, something (for better or for worse) unfamiliar, immediately before I smacked clean into a wall.

"D-dammit..." I muttered, feeling my way around but finding nothing resembling a curve or even a handhold to help stabilize myself. Nothing but moist, rugged stone that tore at my skin like sandpaper, and...a soft figure standing beside me. I squinted at it until I could make it out, an echo flower by the look of it. A moment passed where I expected it to replay the many grunts and other frustrations I had made in my struggle, rubbing salt into the wound, but those sounds never came.

Instead, the flower murmured in its eerily slow, monotonous voice, as if predicting the end of the world, "Behind...you..."

A blue spark flashed out of the corner of my eye, slicing through the dark like an arrow through the sky. I jerked backward at the last possible second, watching the projectile lodge itself mere inches from my face with wide, pulsing eyes and a silent mouth shocked into submission. _Spear._ It illuminated the small area around me, glistening off the water droplets dripping off my skin and the wall, a wall which stretched in seemingly every direction. _Trapped._

A moment later and the weapon had disappeared, flooding the room with shadows once again. The light proved unnecessary for us to see each other, though. A single burning yellow eye pierced the dark, surrounded by the outline of a suit of armor blacker than coals. One hand gripped so tightly around a spear shaft I could almost hear the knuckles popping from under its metal shielding. Undyne stood motionless and stoic as a statue, never training her gaze on anything but mine, not faltering for even a fraction of a second, or to blink. I concentrated all of my energy into maintaining that stare, in refusing to show weakness. _Where did she come from? I should've heard her damn armor clanking..._

"Seven." Undyne's voice did not rumble, echo, or whimper, but stayed even, flat and commanding, a wall in and of itself. Until then I had accepted that she had none, that her eyes and crushing posture alone were enough to communicate her thoughts. "Seven human souls. With the power of seven human souls, our king...King Asgore Dreemurr...will become a _god_." Her grip on the spear tightened. "With that power, Asgore can finally shatter the barrier. He will finally take the surface back from humanity, and return to them the suffering and pain we have endured." A breath hissed through the visor of her helmet, as if all the pain she spoke of passed through her body in a single breath. "Understand, human?"

I wanted to nod casually, but was unable to move. _Of course I understand, you crazy bitch._ My lungs tightened and stung, the air that was supposed to keep me alive now choking me half to death, coupled with a viscous pounding between my eyes.

"There's fear in your eyes...pools of it," Undyne mused, placing a courageous step forward. _Too bad there's nowhere for me to back up._ "This is your one and only chance at redemption, fool. Give up your soul..." She sliced the empty space in front of her as demonstration. I swore I could hear her licking her lips in cruel anticipation. "Or I'll tear it from your body while you still draw breath."

 _A worthless threat. I already stopped breathing._ She didn't advance any farther. I didn't have anywhere to run. _She's actually waiting for me to dignify her request with an answer._ Each instant we stayed there, Undyne only appeared more and more immovable. Invincible. A mountain in my way with a gun drawn to my head, no room over or around it, no possibilities. _Invincible._ Compared to my pathetic form, cowering against a wall beneath my soaked clothes. A shudder crept down my spine, from fear and the damp cold. Seemed almost pointless to attempt anything, since standing and fighting would almost surely end in my soul being torn out of my bloodied corpse. My arm twitched at the memory of the pain Undyne had caused before. Might as well just surrender. All the easier for everyone involved...

 _...But Grey never would've let me off the hook without so much as a fight._

I had spent a good amount of time and energy during my time wandering Waterfall on figuring out what I would say to Undyne in this very scenario, well more than she deserved. A "witty" speech that droned on and on about how I would never surrender to her, how I held no sympathy for her or her people, how I would fight to the last ounce of blood in my body flowed out. At that moment, I realized there was no point. Why waste all that breath on someone so cruel, on something that could just as easily be summed up in two simple words?

"Blow me." The tough glove was already strapped to my hand, my plastic knife in the other, not that it would do so well against Undyne's armor. I stepped as far off the wall as I could without drawing too close to my trapper, giving myself just enough elbow room to dodge around a bit.

The knight scoffed at my request, leaning forward on her long legs with the spearhead held out in front of her. Her eyes seemed to laugh at me as she spoke again. "All the more fun for me."

She charged forward with the force and intimidation of an entire army. I had expected my heart rate to skyrocket off the charts; maybe my lungs would clog again or my blood would freeze solid. Instead, I found myself in a strange place of calm. _Any second now, and she'll be on top me. I'll roll behind her and knock her down, then...then the rest will sort itself out.  
_

Something rustled in the nearby thicket, but I hardly payed it any mind. She was close now, I could almost feel her rancid breath on my face. _Five feet between us...Three feet...NOW-_

"-Undyne!"

The leaves of the brush were thrown backwards as a small figure bounded out and threw itself between the two of us. Undyne and I stopped at the same moment in the interruption, her mid-step and myself hunched over in the start of a roll position, with a dumbfounded expression on my face as if I'd been caught with my pants down around my ankles. _The hell is that kid doing here..?_

"I-I'll help you fight!" the Monster Kid yelled with as much confidence as he could muster. He glanced at Undyne's spear, just inches from his scalp, without so much as a flinching, then turned his attention to me. "YO! You did it! Undyne is _right_ in front of you!" A mischievous smile spread across his face. Undyne and I stayed nearly motionless, watching each other carefully around the little midget, stale breaths against the silence, both dumbstruck at the sudden turn of events. "You've got a front row seat to her fight!" As he took another look around to access the situation, realization seemed to creep into his eyes. "Wait...who is she fighting?"

I grimaced when Undyne's hand lashed out in front of her, but it wasn't in aggression. Instead, she gripped the flesh of Monster Kid's face and began dragging him backwards down the hall. "H-hey!" Confusion flashed over him. His aimless stare bore into me as he disappeared into the dark along with the rapidly fading _clank_ of Undyne's boots. "You aren't going to tell my parents about this, are you?"

I hadn't moved. I _couldn't_ move. I should've been relieved to have prolonged our battle, but instead, I felt my courage wavering, flimsy as a frail wooden raft caught in a furious whirlpool. Now I would have to endure the whole process again, staying adamant as possible. _Fearless, gotta be fearless..._

I ran. Ran as fast as my legs could carry me, each step thudding against the hard earth. _It's what I'm best at, after all._ I spotted another corridor hidden in the dark, and turned down it without question. _Don't hear them up this way, they must've turned back,_ I dared to hope. Not like the situation was brimming with options, anyway. The bunches of echo flowers, the sparks of pollen whisking round and round as if caught in a cyclone, the pounding splashes of water at my feet, I noticed almost none of. Panic swelled in me like a fresh bruise, throbbing and pulsing until I was sure I was going to be sick.

"...If I say my wish, you promise you won't laugh at me?" droned a nearby flower that I hadn't heard in the heat of the moment.

"Of course I won't laugh!" answered another.

"Someday I'd like to climb this mountain we're all buried under, throw my arms up towards the sky, taking in the world around me..."

The closest thing the flora could muster for laughter echoed through the cavern. "H-hey, you said you wouldn't laugh!"

"Sorry, it's just funny. That's my wish too."

Soon, the roof of Waterfall disappeared, after all that time confined within its walls, and a thin reddish glow warmed the air. I held back a gasp at the feeling, as the wetted rock structures began to disappear and I sprinted across a derelict wooden bridge, the last thing between myself and...safety? _No such thing anymore, but the removal of a highly trained and deadly knight breathing down my neck couldn't hurt. Plus, I'd like a change of scenery._ The bridge had begun to run out. Another bound or two, and... _  
_

"Yo! Wait up!"

My spirits dipped at the sound of his shrill voice echoing behind me. I dared to spin my head for look without slowing down, noticing that the kid was separated from Undyne, and crossing the bridge as quickly as his stubby legs could carry him. "Can't talk right now, Small Fry. Beat it!"

"But I need to know-AAH!"

I internally gasped, feet coming to a screeching halt as the kid tripped over his own feet, hurtling off the edge of the bridge at what felt like light speed. "Kid!"

Having no arms to catch himself with, the kid whipped his head around and chomped down on the thin planks of wood as hard as he could. Beads of sweat began rolling down the child's skin as the rest of him dangled over a vertiginous drop, almost certainly doomed to end as a stain on the rocks below.

"Hang on, I've got you!" I called, face muscles clenched almost as tightly as his own. Before I could tank so much as a single step, glint of blue formed in the distance. "Oh, shit!"

The flying spear forced me to squat down as it soared over my head. Undyne herself soon marched into view at the other end of the bridge with a spear in each, seemingly adamant about killing me despite the helpless child hanging mere moments away from an untimely demise. I eyed her furiously while she aimed her weapons at me, feeling the blood begging to pulse viciously behind my gaze shifted down to the Monster Kid swinging over the abyss with his veins popping out of his skull with the effort, up to the stoic knight who hadn't so much as blinked in the kid's direction, then back to the kid. There was no one blocking my escape path, but suddenly, I didn't care. "Some hero you are," I spat, charging for the Monster Kid as if my own life depended on his survival.

Undyne continued whipping spears and ignored my efforts to aid one of the people she insisted she was protecting. I bit my lip to force down a screech of pain as a spear grazed my arm, refusing to let it deter me. Once I had closed the distance, I slid on my knees under the last of her projectiles and threw my hands under what I could grab of the kid. A moment of panicked tugging later and I had hoisted him up, the two of us sprawling out on the bridge in relief, gasping for air as if neither of us would ever draw breath again. _Which could very well be possible,_ I thought, remembering the shadowy knight looming over our exhausted forms. I pushed myself up to confront her as she marched up to us airily, hand pulled tight into a daunting metal fist.

"Y...Y...Yo, dude..." Monster Kid awkwardly rolled to a standing position, putting himself between the two of us for a second time. I could only see the spikes running along the back of his head, his legs and tail shaking like twigs caught in a hurricane, and Undyne's menacing form towering over him.

 _Dammit kid, move..._

"If...If y-you wanna hurt my friend..." he continued, teeth audibly chattering above everything else. Just as the last words crawled from his mouth, he straightened himself, forcing his limbs still. The next time he spoke, his voice was steely as any piece of Undyne's armor. "You're gonna have to go through me, first."

I didn't know how to react to Monster Kid's sudden boldness, or whether to react at all. Undyne clearly didn't either, staring at us incredulously with the rest of her shock hidden under her helmet. I half expected her to throw the child out of the way and proceed with the killing, but she never made the move. Eventually she ran out of patience, slinking back into the cover of darkness, silent as a shadow.

"She...she's gone!" We heaved a collective sigh or relief. "I-I did it!"

"Nice job, kid," I murmured, stretching the limbs I hadn't realized were aching.

He spun around to me with an enormous grin on his face. _And not a single tooth out of place. One hell of a jaw on that one..._ "Hey dude, I wouldn't even be _standing_ here if it weren't for you! Can't believe Undyne was gonna let me just fall...some hero I've been chasing, right?" he mused, a twinge of sadness crossing his lips, but only for a moment. "So lemme just get this outta the way—you're a human, right?"

I shrugged, deciding there was no harm in coming clean. "Took you long enough to figure it out. Although in your defense, most of the adults in this place can't tell a human from an eggplant."

"Well...Undyne did say 'stay away from that human,' so I kinda figured..."

A smile crept across my face. "That works too."

We shared an artless laugh, as if we were splitting the bill at a diner somewhere and not mere paces away from where we had nearly been butchered a few instants ago. It felt surprisingly good, to add another member to the "List of People Who Don't Make Me Want to Kill Myself." _Maybe I need to try this more often._

Monster Kid's laugh came to a sharp halt. "I guess...that means we have to be enemies, or something?"

I waved off the suggestion. "Please. I think I'd need a super computer and an entire team of mathematicians to calculate how many enemies I have. Don't need any more."

He chuckled at that. "Then...friends?"

 _Friends. If you'd asked me maybe three days ago, I would've asserted I'd never need them._

 _I was damn stupid three days ago._

"I like the sound of that better."

"Okay," he nodded. "I've...uh...I've probably gotta get home now. I bet my parents are worried sick about me!" He began to back off the bridge, nervously eyeing the spot where he'd nearly fallen until he was finally on solid ground. "And, yo, if you see Undyne again...I think you can take her. Her aim _really_ isn't that good with those spears," he half-whispered.

I nodded in response. "I think I might take you up on that," I admitted, turning my attention on the path in front of me. After watching her ignore one of her own people on the brink of death, hearing her promise not just myself, but the entire human race a painful destruction, I couldn't contain my anger towards Undyne any longer. It had festered and rotted beyond recognition. If she were to follow me to the edge of the Underground seeking my demise, I would be forced to confront her sooner or later. And this time, there would be no running away. Undyne's time masquerading as a "hero" would be coming to a glorious end.

"I'm ready."

"Good luck," Monster Kid disappeared with those as his parting words.

I sucked in some air to get the blood flowing again, taking long strides until the sound of running water faded to less than a whimper, and the red glow grew brighter. Soon the ceiling had entirely crumbled, and I was left gawking up at the tops of harsh stone spires that appeared to have had the life crushed out of them centuries before, even darker against the rich color of the air. The change in scenery did not deter me in the slightest, not even when one of these foreboding structures rose high above the road ahead of me, the only way forward to pass through a grotto carved in the center. My eyes traced the side of the underground mountain until I had reached the peak, where a lone knight stood with her back to me, standing in wait, a sculpture against a fiery background. Her voice rang out through the open air, somehow larger than the vast expanse of broken land itself, gouging the silence.

"Human."


	25. Chapter 25: Messed Up Sense of Justice

"...You gonna say something else, or just keep standing there 'dramatically?'" Undyne's silhouette stood vibrant against the cool red backdrop, wind whistling between the prodigious rock spires.

"Both," she hissed. The wind sputtered and died out, cowering from the venom in her voice. Deafening silence stole its place, left untouched just long enough to give me second thoughts before they were scattered by the knight. "Seven human souls, and King Asgore will become a god." She paused, no doubt reveling in the spotlight. "Six. That's how many we've collected thus far." A single yellow eye flashed in the eye socket of her helmet, staring me down with that same burning intensity it always possessed. _Looking for some kind of weakness._ "Understand, Human?"

I nodded slowly and folded my arms over my chest, patience waning, focused on keeping my voice and posture free of any tension Undyne could catch. "Yes, I believe I understand how to count to seven."

"Through your seventh and final soul," she droned on, rigid as a board, as if reading her speech off a script, "this world will be transformed. First, however, as is customary for those who make it this far, I shall tell you the tragic tale of our people-"

"How about," I snarled, "we skip the history lesson, and the annoying babble, and move ahead to the part that actually matters?" I used the very brief moment of Undyne's stunned silence as an opportunity to get the lay of the land for our battle. Assuming she would eventually make the first move, we would be fighting on the only leveled plane of flat stone amidst the jagged mountains. I kicked at the ground to ensure it remained flat, pleasantly surprised to find it smooth. It allowed us more than enough room to keep our footing, but getting forced off the edge would almost certainly lead to a painful impalement on the sharp crag below. _Impaled on a spear or impaled on a rock? The possibilities seem endless..._

"Okay, you know what, SCREW IT!" Undyne bellowed, and the wind picked up to a deafening howl. I raised my arm to shielded my eyes from the storm, while Undyne seemed totally unphased. "Why should I tell scum like you that story when you're about to DIE!?"

In one, swift motion, Undyne grabbed hold of the base of her helmet and rolled it off, sending it tumbling down the spire, taking any loose earth it crashed into with it, until it finally rolled to a stop at my feet beside a few pebbles. Ignoring the thousand-yard-stare the empty hunk of metal was giving me, I attempted to get a good look at the knight despite the wind's protests. "Wait, you're...you're a fish?"

"YOU!" Undyne wore an overconfident smirk filled with bright yellow teeth to match her one good eye. An eye patch rested over the other one, darker than even the navy blue tone of her skin. What I had assumed was a feather sticking out of the back of her helmet was actually a ponytail of blood red hair flowing behind her, a flame flickering in the wind. A pair of fins stretched from either side of her head where ears should have been, the only real notable fish-like features that I could make out. Before I could decide whether the helmet had made her more or less intimidating, she shouted to the gale, "You're standing in the way of everyone's hopes and dreams!"

A lame, "H-huh?" passed through my lips before I could process her blather.

"Alphys' history books made me think humans were cool, with their giant robots and flowery swordsmen...but you..." A sneer of abhorrence ate the bottom half of her face, and her eye narrowed to a slit sharper than any one of her spears. "You're just a coward! Hiding behind that _kid_ so you could run from me again..."

Hearing Fish Lips bring up the Monster Kid finally snapped me out of my shock. " _I'm_ the coward?" A sharp kick from myself sent Undyne's helmet careening into the abyss below. I didn't notice the pain in my toes until later, and the wind suddenly seemed a distant fog. "You've got a messed up sense of justice, lady. You're the one running around playing the hero while _I'm_ saving the people you're oh-so-keen on protecting!" I jammed my thumb into my chest, my soul, as I spoke again. "I stuck my neck out for that kid while you were prepared to slit my throat and watch him fall! And for what? So your king can slaughter the entire human race to get back at us for doing the same thing an eternity ago? Why don't you swim off and give him my congrats on conceiving the most backwards-ass goals of all time!"

"How _dare_ you!?" she spat, veins popping out of their flesh, curling her armored fingers into a fist with an exaggerated flourish. "I'll crush your body into millions of tiny fragments for speaking out against the King of Monsters like that! You _humans_ really are all the same impudent fools." She ground the word between her teeth, vomited it out in a cesspool of bile and hate. She held a glare that carried generations of fiery scorn, as one carries the blood of an ancestor. "Your continued existence is nothing short of a crime! Your life is all that stands between us and our freedom!" A spear materialized in her palm, immediately snapped in two from how hard she was clenching it, and was quickly replaced with another. "Right now, I can feel everyone's hearts pounding together! They've all been waiting their entire lives for this moment!" The anger vanished from Undyne's composure, replaced with rigid conviction. "But we're not nervous at all. When everyone puts their hearts together, they can't lose!"

"You finished talking to yourself yet?" I snorted, taking a fighting stance of my own. _This is it, make or break. No more time for any doubts. As if I'd lose to some crazy, vengeful flounder..._

My eyes darted to the red and orange horizon for a split second, all the swirling colors of autumn leaves, or a quiet bonfire chasing away cold winds. "And, Undyne? You're wrong about those hearts. Because I know there are least a couple out there somewhere beating for mine!"

Now it was the fish's turn to snort. "Yeah? Then prove it! I'll show you how determined monsters can be!" She launched off the top of her perch with a battle cry that rang louder than anything a thousand soldiers could have mustered. "Here! I! COOOOOOME!"

As Undyne plummeted towards me with a spear pointed at my chest, I waited for time to slow down and my first move to become painfully clear. When that moment never came, I promptly panicked, stumbling away as the knight smashed into the earth with enough force to shake the planet, throwing shards of stone large and sharp as knives through the air. She hardly took any time to recover from the impact and had thrust another spear-point in my general direction before I could even begin to consider blinking, let alone planning any retaliation. The strike passed inches from my head, probably taking out a few loose hairs in the process, and distracted me long enough for Undyne to deliver a heavy kick to my stomach.

"Hurgh!" I gurgled, the air sapped from my lungs. I tried to keep my footing as best I could as my vision dipped into blackness, pain seared in my abdomen, and Undyne forced me back with another wide swipe of her lance. _Back towards the ledge,_ I realized. If I didn't attempt to fight back soon, she would have me beaten before the battle even began. _I wonder if she still gets the soul if I jump..._

I pushed the thought out of my mind as Fish Lips prepared another blow, a sinister combination of concentration and calmness in that single yellow eye, as though this were something she did every day. A soldier with potential years of training and experience under her belt, pitted against some punk city kid who had observed plenty of fights and hardly ever participated in any of them. Tough odds to beat, to put it lightly. As if I hadn't known that to begin with. _Seriously though, jumping is always an option._

Instead, I refocused my efforts on dodging the knight's ceaseless attacks. I had the endurance to keep up with her, but Undyne was no slouch herself, and I would be pressured into some stupid move sooner or later. _Lets see...she's tougher than me, more experienced than me, has pointier weaponry, and is nearly just as quick as me while wearing a suit of armor. I'll have to figure some other way to wear her down._

"You...uh," I hacked between breaths and pauses in her assault, "You're pretty light on your feet, for a fish." She feinted an attack on my right and swung upwards instead, a half-step away from slicing me in half. I managed to throw a punch, but she recovered her balance and leaped back well beyond where I could hit her. At the very least, she gave me a moment to gather myself. "Ever consider ballet or tap dancing? Think they might be a better fit for you."

She groaned her contempt. "Speak for yourself, Twinkle Toes."

I darted under her spear as she struck again, putting her back to the rocky cliffs and allowing me a well deserved breather. We began circling the distance between us as though the earth would crumble if either of us took a step forward. Undyne seemed triumphant as ever, eyes and spear glowing with confidence, without a single red hair out of place. On the opposite side of the coin, I struggled to catch my breath and appear the slightest bit menacing, scraggly strands of black hairs damp with sweat disrupting my vision. As if the harsh winds tearing at my eyes weren't enough already.

"I bet I can guess what you're thinking, human," Undyne began cruelly, and she smiled her sinister yet jubilant grin. "You're thinking about how stupid you are for choosing to fight, wishing you could go back and choose differently. Maybe if you kneel down and beg, I'll consider making it end quickly for you. Just maybe."

 _And she's a mind reader. Fortunate that she outclasses me in_ every _way. God forbid I have a single, solitary advantage._

Begging was an option long since passed, which left only one response. "I think I'd rather you chop me up and serve me medium-rare to your damned king than go down pleading for my life, lady," I sneered. "You should've guessed that by now."

She merely shrugged in response to my obstinacy, casually using her spear as an absurdly oversized toothpick. "Suit yourself. It's more fun this way, anyhow."

The flash in her eye was well concealed, but not well enough for me to miss it. A moment later and I heard the whizzing of spears piercing the air, spun around and saw the points of them rapidly approaching, a few arms length away at most. I jerked out of the path of one, nearly got stabbed in the face by another, and the third caught me across the arm, leaving behind a mess of torn fabric and a nasty bright red gash. Biting my lip to distract from the pain, I began to fall into the rhythm of dodging the projectiles, springing back and forth over the plateau as though the fight were a lopsided dance. _Shame my partner's jewelry keeps digging into my skin._

Undyne was up and moving again the instant the assault ended, but the effort of conjuring so many weapons must have left her fatigued. She stepped forward so sluggishly that I had the time to react even with my back turned, and as she shoved her spear towards me I easily sidestepped and grabbed its shaft, throwing the knight off balance. Her look of bewilderment was speedily helped by a gloved fist straight to her good eye, the flesh curling beneath my knuckles giving off a strangely satisfying feeling, accompanied beautifully by her shriek of "NGAHHH!" I reared back to lay into her again, but she jerked her spear free and wrenched it from my grasp, buying herself space.

"Ugh..." she muttered through clenched teeth, arm twitching as though she were fighting the urge to massage her rapidly swelling eye. "I let _you_ hit me...?" A few specks of my blood had somehow found their way onto her gauntlet, blood I could have sworn was sizzling like eggs on a stove. Suddenly, she straightened up with a wince, returning to her usual stance. "Out with it, human! What hardened warrior trained you to dodge like that?"

I would've attempted to stare smugly back at her, had she actually decided to wait for response. Instead she crashed down on me again like a wave at high tide, with all the same poise and ferocity as before. I became fixated on her calculated movements, learning from the strict intensity of the battle while it was happening. My head was soon filled with the intense pounding of blood through my veins. _There is something strangely exciting about being a swipe away from death at any moment._

It was increasingly obvious the blow to her eye had impaired her perception more than she let on. With one totally covered and the other nearly forced shut, she couldn't have seen the fists coming until they were inches from her face. She squinted feverishly through the dim light, the fearlessness of her glare lost, trapped behind a wall of bruised and twisted flesh.

"Never had any training, unless you count dodging 'round people and cars on the street," I finally responded as Undyne fell back to catch her breath. My knuckles had begun to sting, my lungs were burning from the kick she had delivered, and the severe cut on my arm certainly wasn't getting any better, but I somehow still came out looking better than the knight. _Weird. Maybe the king's one-eyed lackey is all talk after all._ "But you clearly need a few more minutes on the grill if you're losing to me, cyclops."

She growled at my jab, taking an lunging step forward with her spear pointed at my head. I avoided it with about as much effort as I'd take pedaling a bicycle downhill and swung wildly, connecting with the side of her head with enough power to send her sprawling to the ground like a fish flopping against a port deck. "If it's any consolation," I spoke through the corner of my mouth, face scrunched up from the pain, "I think that last blow hurt my hand just as much, if not _more_ than it hurt your face."

"ENOUGH!"

There was a blinding flash of green light brilliant enough to make a supernova blush, and the battleground vanished into oblivion. An incessant ringing permeated the air, like the chorus of white noise that follows a gunshot, sent me recoiling backwards. I threw my hands over my ears in a futile attempt to block out the sound as it grew to a deafening, triumphant roar, although I might as well have been attempting to catch bullets in the gaps between my fingers. Just as everything became too much to bear, I felt my legs snag on something, and the awful ringing and brightness were carried away on the wind's shrieks.

Cautiously, I ventured to lower my arms and inch my eyelids open, waiting for them to readjust to the dull caverns, listening for hints that Undyne had begun to attack again. None came at first, which only made me more suspicious.

"That's it? Hardly worth the theatric shouting of 'ENOUGH' if you ask me," I scoffed, choosing to ignore the salty sea of sweat pooling on my skin. "Your big trump card was really a laser light show? I mean, it was loud and irritating as any, but that pretty much goes without saying..."

The knight spat a thick glob of blood out onto the stone out on the stone floor, smiling a set of stained pink teeth condescendingly, as though she had suddenly gained the upper hand. "Then come at me again, Human."

"My plea-"

The words snagged in my throat, along with all my forward momentum. I threw a glance downward to spot the obstruction, an action that immediately became a panicked stare. A bunch of ivy, the same dignified shade of green as Undyne's spark from before, had wound their way between my legs. The color of my soul had even changed to match. I blinked stupidly in stunned disbelief, then began to struggle against them, pulling and slicing at them with all the energy I could muster, helpless as a wild animal snared in a bear trap. No matter how I tried to move, they tugged back with twice as much force. The bastards were thin as wisps of air, and yet tough as thick steel cables. _Whaddya know. She suddenly gained the upper hand._

"It's over then, human," Undyne feigned lament, dragging her thumb slowly across the skin on her neck. "Unless you learn to stop running from your problems and face danger head on, you're good as dead already. Not like you ever stood much of a chance to begin with..." she laughed at herself, as though our entire confrontation until now had been nothing but a joke, and my inevitable defeat the sad, predictable, chronically unfunny punchline.

I considered what she had said a moment. _Stop running from your problems and learn to face dangers head on._

 _How fucking poetic._

The first wave of spears came at my front, Undyne choosing to remain at a distance while she concentrated and regained her composure. I was able to avoid them by the skin of teeth for a spell, shifting my body back and forth as if I were balancing on stilts, leaning as far as I could in either direction, hearing them whiz by my ears, feeling them pass under my arms and tear through the fabric of my coat like putty. For a while I had myself convinced I could withstand the onslaught, but I was only kidding myself. Undyne and I both knew it was only a matter of time before one found its rather painful mark, and it came as no surprise when a spear point sunk into my knee with a stomach lurching slice before vanishing, leaving a steady trail of fresh blood in its wake. _Knowing its coming doesn't make it any less painful though_ , I noted, clutching at the wound as though I could somehow contain the pain by squeezing it until it went numb. The entire damn leg would've buckled had I not been held up by those vines.

"Honestly, I'm doing you a favor," Undyne assured me, content with watching me struggle for the time being. "No one human has _ever_ made it past King Asgore. Killing you is an act of mercy."

"As nice as you and your king sound, I think I'll pass." The pause in the barrage had given me just enough time to shove the remainder of a space food bar in my mouth and force it down with a pained swallow. As the familiar flood of relief kissed at broken skin and mended my tattered clothes, Undyne shot me a look of pure bewilderment, as if I had suddenly sprouted wings and flew out of her trap.

"You seriously brought monster food to a fight?" she spat incredulously. "Damn craven."

"Not my fault you decided to fight dirty," I grunted, gesturing carelessly towards my entangled friends down south. "The hardware store run out of super glue or something?"

She flashed me her award winning grin, so overblown and self-important I could imagine it perfectly catching the sunlight, glimmering like a little row of gemstones. _And w_ _hat an inspiring image it is._ "Spare me your pathetic attempts at insults, and spare yourself the effort it takes to fabricate them." She jerked her thumb at her breastplate. "I don't know how you humans do it up on the surface, but down here, we've no need to buy our skills."

"Investing a few bucks certainly couldn't have hurt..."

An aggravated spear flung through the air that nicked the top of my ear was her response, and the battle was back in full swing. It was then, when my morale had situated itself at what I thought was its absolute lowest point, that it dawned on me just how utterly and undoubtedly screwed I really was. Unless Undyne got the sudden desire to throw her life away, which given the circumstance and the evidence didn't seem all too likely, then she could effortlessly wait well outside my range for me to tire of her constant assault. Sure, she could run out of gas sooner than me, but I only had so many bits of monster food to heal myself with, and one spear in the wrong place could end the fight instantly. I felt like an ant, slowly being smoldered by the sun's harsh rays from under a magnifying glass, completely at the mercy of something out of my control, too tiny and helpless to defend myself. _Good thing that last part is only half true._

Everything had been going swimmingly, or at least as good as someone being relentless pummeled by some crazy fish could be, until one harpoon shot out of the corner of my eye, and a sharp pained stabbed below my ribcage. The world shuddered and lurched like a boat being thrown by the ocean's violent current, and I let loose a sound that was something caught between a whimper and a pained cry for help, feeling my flesh twist as though it were being pulled through a meat grinder while everything else went numb. I dared to place a hand over the wound for no sane reason, as if stuck in a trance, yanking it back to find it glistening from palm to finger tip with fresh blood. _As if I should have been expecting anything else._

Undyne didn't leave me a moment to recover, or even to think on the pain, let it sink in just how badly I was losing. More spears flanked my right side, nipping at my skin with all the delicateness of a cobra's bite. Another sank into the back of my leg, cold as an icicle, staggering me to the floor. I bit my lip to keep from sinking to my knees and sobbing, but the defiance did nothing to encourage me.

Especially not when staring death in its eyes.

I raised my head to a cluster of the damn spears flashed just a few meters from my face, close enough that I could see the tips gleaming, tearing at my eyes. There was no time to dodge, as if I could move my leg, or grab a bit of monster food and shove it my mouth, let alone have the healing take place. I shut my eyes and threw my arms up in some half-assed last defense, as though the weapons sharp enough to tear me in half could somehow be stopped by the same flesh they'd been cutting through all along-

-A loud "clang!" sounded through the air, out of place as a circus performer at a funeral.

 _...Wait a minute, that's not what I expected dying to sound like at all. Weak._

I inched my eyes open, the image of the spears hovering in front of me still fresh in my mind, feeling my heart catch in my throat when I realized...the spears were still hovering in front of me. They hung suspended in front of me, surrounded by a hazy green glow that seemed to curl around my arms, almost like a shield of some kind.

"What!? No!" Undyne screeched, gaping at my equally-if-not-more-confused stare, pounding her fist into the ground. "How the hell are you managing that?"

"Even if I knew, why the hell would I tell you?" I muttered back, surprised I had found the words at all. I let my arms drop back and the force field disappeared along with it, spears collapsing uselessly to the ground. My soul seemed to be popping out of my chest, shining with...whatever power had aided me. _You know what, I'll roll with it. If Ms. Captain of the Royal Guard wants to go around tossing out super powers to her greatest rival, that's fine by me._ I chomped down on another space food bar, put my fists up as though stepping into a boxing ring, and let out an ill-confident sigh. "Okay...okay, round two."

Undyne growled and brandished her weapon furiously. "There shouldn't _be_ a round two!"

Spears began appearing faster than they ever had before, crossing from all sides in rapid succession. I kept my arms curled in front of me and peered anxiously over the tops of my fists for the oncoming projectiles, concentrating intently, moving to block whenever one came into my vision. Before long the stab of fear that came every time one drew close was on the back of my mind, and the process became second nature.

Undyne, realizing that her attack patterns were becoming absolutely worthless, took to the offensive. She leapt into the air and brought her spear down hard enough to crush asphalt, and yet it bounced off my arms as though she were whacking at a mountainside with an old pool noodle. "For years, we've dreamed of a happy ending..." She swung again and again, and every time I met the blow as best I could, keeping her at bay with less than half the effort it took her to keep plowing away. "And now, sunlight is just within our reach!" I pivoted around to block an attempted strike at my back, managing it with hardly a sweat. "I won't let you snatch it away from us!"

"Yeah, sounds great and all, 'cept for the part where you'll step over anyone and everyone in your way, like a bunch of... _cockroaches_ until you can get your damn 'sunlight,'" I retorted, eyeing her near breathless form with a sense of satisfaction. _She's struggling, and trying desperately to hide it._ "I'd be having second thoughts about this whole business if I were you. Fish don't tend to last too long once they surface, and you look like you'd burn easy with that precious skin of yours."

"Shut it!"

I blinked at her. "First 'enough' and now 'shut it'...You ran out of comebacks, didn't you? Why don't you swim off and ask your King for more, since you're so obligated to regurgitate everything he says anyway."

I deflected her next attack as easily as I would have brushed off a pesky mosquito. "It takes more to win a fight than some petty comebacks!" she cried, throwing herself at me for the umpteenth time. "It takes dedication! It takes years of training your patience and perseverance! It takes-

"-So the warrior's code outlaws comebacks, but rambling like an old fart is fine?"

"NGAHHH! Die already, you little brat!"

It all happened in an instant. There was a wave of heat nausea tugging at my skull and at my stomach. My soul faded back to its dull red color. The vines holding me still ceased to exist along with the barrier protecting my arms and body from harm. Although I was seeing double, I could still make out the shaking image of a spear cutting towards me.

I slogged out of the way, legs feeling heavy as the armor coating Undyne's skin, brought my fist up and brushed the air where her face had been milliseconds before. We moved in a chaotic blur around each other, thrashing at the slightest chances for either of us to land a blow. She jabbed me in the arm with the butt of her spear while I punched at an opening in her armor, giving us both a reason to back off. I stumbled towards the opening in the rock face Undyne had perched on before, leaning against the wall for support. _God damn. Why is the air so hot here? First the wind was making it impossible to fight, now I feel like I would kill for a breeze..._

My eyelids shot open. The warm air was seeping from out of the darkness further down the tunnel. My eyes darted back to Undyne, who was already preparing to launch at me again. _Undyne, plus hot dry air, equals...fish out of water._

I started down the path before I could debate the option of staying and fighting, let alone come up with some alluring insult to get her to chase me. "W-Where are you going, coward!?" Undyne hollered after me, and the heavy pounded of her footsteps followed. I heard the spears flying at my head before I saw them, and ducked just in time to see them whisk by the top of my head. Everything had quieted to a pitch black, the thick layer of heat threatening to suffocate me like a thick plastic bag. A wall appeared as if for no other purpose than for me to run into it, and I turned right down the corridor. Light trickled in through what I could make out to be the exit, maybe fifty strides away at the most. I gave a sideways glance to a bright neon sign that extended across the wall to my left, bright scrolling letters spelling out "W-E-L-C-O-M-E—T-O—H-O-T-L-A-N-D."

 _I swear these names just keep getting lazier and lazier as I go._

"Stop running and fight me!" Undyne huffed, her exhaustion becoming evident in her shallow breaths.

"Sometimes running is just the easiest choice."

The heat from inside the cave had been a cool autumn day compared to the blaze that hit me once I broke out into the blindingly bright light. I shielded my eyes and kept running, almost barreling off a cliff in the process. _And what a tragic fall that would've been._

"S-Shit!" I gasped, tripping over myself until I was as far away from the edge as I could be without backing right into my pursuer. I stood on an earthy plateau red as desert sand, suspended what felt like miles above what I could only assume was either the Center of the Earth, or Hell itself. Rivers of molten magma raged against the base of it, an infinite supply of it spilling over and over itself, roaring furiously enough to make the breath catch in my lungs and stay there until I choked on it. _Actually, you know what, Undyne? How 'bout we go finish things like gentlemen back over in Waterfall, maybe with a game of cards?_

It was a nice thought, but the sound of her drawing close behind me seemed much more real at the moment. I started forward again, the sands beneath my feet feeling alien to me after so much time spent in Waterfall. My attention was concentrated mostly on not dying, so it came as no surprise when I hardly noticed the skeleton dozing off behind a guard post until I was already past him. "Sans! Give me a hand!" I yelled over my shoulder, although if he had heard me, he didn't show it. If not for his grizzly bear snores, I would have thought him dead. _He is a skeleton after all..._ "Sans! WAKE UP!" Still no response. "Oh, you mother fu-"

"-Heh...heh...HUMAN!"

 _I'll deal with him later._

As seemed to always be the case in dire situations like this, my only means of escape was to cross a rickety rope bridge hanging over certain death. I sprinted across it, choosing not to fret over the sea of fiery rock below. The threat of Undyne had become nothing more than a few sudden wheezes and the sound of her half walking, half crawling along the boards behind me. I wanted to sigh in relief when my feet touched solid ground, but I still had my teeth clenched tight in anxiousness. I slowed to a halt, wiped at the sweat flowing freely down my forehead and turned to find out just how well my plan had worked.

The knight lumbered up, appearing to have aged twenty years during the chase. Her skin was cracked and dry, not a speck of sweat to be found. There was a strained desperation to her eyes that seemed alien beside her unyielding resolve. A gaping mouth choking on dry air accompanied them. As she made her way toward me, her legs shook and trembled as though they were supporting a mountain. I stared in awed silence as a final strangled gasp escaped Undyne, and the immovable titan crashed to the ground in a heap of blazing metal and reeking flesh.

Everything went silent, save for the uninterruptible crashing of lava below us. _She's breathing. Barely, but she's breathing._

 _Should I stop her?_

I glanced down at my gloved hand, back at the helpless form of the knight and shuddered in disgust. _Can't do it, dammit._

Just when I had thought I mustered up the courage to walk away from the soon-to-be corpse, I noticed something that would've have been hilariously out of place under any different circumstances. A water cooler, the kind you'd find in any office building on the planet, was placed all too conveniently a few feet away, cups and all. My eyes darted back and forth between it and the fish out of water, brain threatening to explode.

 _She tried to kill you._

 _She'll die if I just stand here._

 _She'll try it again._

 _I promised I wouldn't kill anyone._

 _So what? She got herself here by her own will. Plus she's nuts._

 _I can't let that damn flower get his way..._

By the time I had made up my mind, I already stood over Undyne's withering body with two cups filled to the brim with water, one ice cold and the other warm as blood. I bent over and tilted her ugly mug up, pouring as much of the warm water between her lips as I could. Once she had her fill, I carelessly tossed the remaining cold water onto her face.

Undyne bolted upright with what little energy she had left, eyes wide open in desperate confusion. "Huh? Wha-"

She came face to face with the sight of me, probably her most hated person in the universe, standing over her with two empty cups and no more patience left in a single bone in my body. I chucked the cups away, not bothering to check where they landed, and looked back at her. Challenging her to attack me. Daring her to throw her life away.

She did neither. Instead, she slowly climbed to her feet and started backing away, refusing to break eye contact for even a second. Refusing to admit defeat even after being resurrected from the dead. It wasn't until she was halfway across the bridge that she finally turned around and stalked off, brisk as ever.

I let out the breath I'd been holding. "Good riddance."

Somehow, standing there, surrounded on all sides by smoldering fires, still a long way away from anything close to home, I allowed myself to feel the slightest bit safe for the first time since leaving Snowdin. _Snowdin...Papyrus._ I fought with my pockets 'till I could find the phone I'd gotten from The Ruins. _Sixty-three messages, huh? Guess I owe the guy a minute of my time..._


	26. Chapter 26: Undyne

"Leave it to The Skull-for-Brains Papyrus himself to cook up a plan this crazy."

"The only individuals crazier than The Great Papyrus are those who would willingly agree to his convoluted follies and otherwise wacky antics, human."

"...Ya got me there."

I sauntered naturally down the damp, black corridors of Waterfall, as though I was going for a casual stroll through the park. The faint splashes of coursing rivers bleeding into and clashing with one another had become so familiar, almost nostalgic in a way, they almost provided a feeling close to comfort. I should have been outraged at any request to retrace my steps, to waste more of my time and put myself at further risk, and yet I couldn't help but be relieved. My first glimpses of Hotland, of the daunting fires and air dry enough to make my skin crack like ice under the heel of a heavy boot, coupled with Papyrus's urging had been leagues more than enough to convince me to hide out in the cool caverns a little while longer. _Not hiding, I'm...making preparations for the rest of the journey. Don't see how myself or any monster could mistake it for anything else._

"Can't imagine Undyne lasting more than thirty seconds in a room with anyone else without screaming about justice or trying to kill them. Let alone her worst enemy," I warned the skeleton over the phone. "Did I mention this plan is insane? Because it is. Insane."

"If you and Undyne befriend one another," he began his redundant explanation, "then there will be no need for any further violence!" Personally, I would've preferred the stubborn old knight shove one of her spears as far up her own asshole as possible rather than attempt any sort of commune with her. Papyrus, with his typical breed of naïve innocence, seemed obsessed with the idea of us putting aside the bad blood between us and becoming fast friends. Implying that scars running deep as your bones could be sealed with a band-aid and mended overnight. "Otherwise, she will simply hunt you down and try to capture you again!" He clicked his teeth together in pause. "I cannot have my two closest friends fighting, human."

I sighed through the phone's receiver. "Yeah, yeah. I know." He had a point, after all. The idea of it made me sick to my stomach, and coaxing Undyne into dropping her ambitions seemed a more ludicrous possibility than sprouting wings myself and flying out of the Underground, but what was the alternative? Having her pursue me, sniffing me out like some mutt before pouncing for the kill? Or maybe she'd send her lackeys, the members of the royal guard I hadn't the pleasure of acquainting? Neither sounded very appealing, although they still somehow seemed the easier options at the moment. At the very least, I might...persuade her into finding some new obsessions. "You'll be there to make sure she's not at my throat immediately, right?"

"Of course! I've already spoken with Undyne and arranged for the meeting! I even made her sign a legal document clearly stating that she will make no acts of aggression towards the opposing party."

 _So she knows I'm coming._ "Pretty thorough there, huh?" _Closer to totally overboard and utterly useless, but if it makes him feel safer..._

"The Great Papyrus is always unnecessarily thorough in everything he does!" he cheered triumphantly, as though accepting an award no one thought to offer him. "Are you close, human? I trust you found the directions I gave you helpful?"

"Hard to get lost in a straight line, but I appreciate the effort regardless." I had already made the trek past the staunch, glowing mushroom stalks, through the cramped catacombs teeming with plant life, beside the small mine that Gerson no doubt still had his shriveled nose buried in, and had arrived just within sniffing range of the rancid junk pit. Thank god for that, the stench brought such beloved memories of that ill righteous cyclops slithering back. Waterfall's monstrous inhabitants had paid me little mind on the return trip, perhaps reluctant to engage me after witnessing their strongest link limping home in shamed defeat. The lack of attention didn't bother me. Papyrus's near obnoxious levels of energy made more than enough up for that. Dude could generate enough energy to power an entire city block.

"That's Grey's house..." I muttered, recognizing the crooked old home instantly. It still wobbled and tottered like a drunk old woman on roller blades, but Napstablook had seemingly begun to make repairs and spruce up the place a bit. The window pane had been replaced with a glossy new one, and the patchy blue paint had been scraped off and repainted at the very base of the home. A blank white banner was rolled up alongside a dusty set of speakers, a hint of rainbow colored text leaping off the canvas from underneath the edges, the rest tucked away in the folds.

"Grey who?" Papyrus asked.

"That ghost who runs the snail farm. You know, floats around, sighs a lot, terrible taste in music? Pretty sure Napstablook is his real name."

"Ah, yes, I remember that civilian! He once struggled over to me whilst on guard duty and tried to start a friendly conversation, but I could barely get his name before he flew away with hardly a goodbye. Perhaps he was just in a hurry. Like most citizens I attempt to converse with..."

"That's the one," I interrupted his prattling, for both our sake.

"You're very close now, human. Undyne's house should be just around the corner."

Undyne's not-so humble abode resided just a few paces away from Napstablook's, a thin blanket of rock separating the two. The building sulked in its crushingly dark corner as though waiting for the ceiling to inevitably cave in on itself, hardly a fitting attitude for the warrior living inside. Its design, on the other hand, couldn't have represented her big-headed nature better if she'd had it meticulously sculpted in the form of her face. It was curved in an almost eggshell shape, pale on one side and shaded on the other, short but large enough to force itself on as much of the small space as possible, leaving no breathing room in the chamber. I noticed how the sagging shingles were rounded and laced together like a set of fish scales, one over the other, coupled with large matching elastic fins trailing along the back and the sides, as though they house itself were planning on taking a dip in Waterfall's trash-ridden waters. Two windows were placed on the front, curved into the shape of those twin glaring eyes, sharp as a pair of daggers that pierced the mind's defenses and hunted relentlessly for weaknesses. The real cherry on the cake was the mane of crimson hair flowing in messy tufts behind the building, pulled into a tight ponytail identical to its owner's. Regardless of how much over-designing and decorations Undyne threw over it, she couldn't hide just how unsalvageable the place really was. She might as well have been repainting the shell of an old, broken down Corvette.

Papyrus stood to the side of Undyne's personal travesty, awkwardly tugging at his gloves until his eye sockets met mine. He shut his phone and eagerly waved me over. I hadn't realized how long it'd been since I last saw his big toothy grin or that ridiculous orange cape-scarf that seemed to catch the wind no matter where or if it existed. In fact, I hadn't realized I missed them at all. He had a small but blatant look of relief to his expression, and more than a few nervous beads of sweat dotting his face. "Human!" he blurted, even more jittery than I remembered.

"Sup," I said coolly, ignoring the flood of relief that followed his greeting. That relief didn't last for more than a few seconds. Without slightest hint of hesitation, he bounded over in a blur and threw his bony arms around my waist.

"Muh!-" I choked out, cut off as my face was pressed against the ice-cold surface of his chest plate. I immediately started struggling against the startlingly strong embrace, but Papyrus held fast, oblivious to my resistance. _What else is new._

"Never scare The Great Papyrus like that ever again, human," he said evenly, evidently having rehearsed the words beforehand. "When you refused my attempts to reach you, I feared...I feared the worst."

"...That's great and all, but it doesn't mean shit if you suffocate me right here!" I sputtered, making another effort to shove the skeleton off.

"Oh, of course." Papyrus finally loosened his grip enough for me to slither out. "My apologies, human."

"Almost makes me think you missed me or something," I gasped, brushing the dust from the arms of my jacket. Now with some spare oxygen free to circulate to my brain, I thought about what Paps had said. Since his biggest of many blunders, or at least that's how it felt at the time, I hadn't thought much about why I had shunned him in the first place, and the rage steadily boiled down the less attention I payed it. He had stupidly given Undyne an easy way to identify me and inadvertently painted a target on my back, or something of the like. I remembered vividly that intense feeling of betrayal which plagued my thoughts, another infection of the brain to rival the plentiful others. It seemed so asinine in retrospect to think a detail as trivial as my current wardrobe made tracking me down any easier in a place so empty and devoid of life to begin with. An extra target on your back didn't mean much with a scope already patiently trained on your skull, and no crowd to lose it in. "Sorry I didn't contact you sooner," I said at last, concealing my embarrassment. "Wasn't fair of me to storm off and leave you in the dark like that."

"It was an understandable decision," Papyrus assured me. His voice had faltered a bit, as if a stubborn feeling of guilt or disappointment for himself still gnawed at his consciousness. "I was so overjoyed when you finally called, my arm shot out and knocked the pot of spaghetti I was boiling across the room just reaching for my phone." He winced. "You'd be astounded by just how difficult it was to speak clearly with scalding hot burns across your forearms."

"Sounds rough," I chuckled. "Good to know I wasn't the only one going through tough times during our time apart."

Papyrus let out a cackle that my joke hardly deserved. He wouldn't hear me say it, but having something close to a casual conversation again lifted a burden off my shoulders. _Only about thirty more to go._ "So human, what do you think of Undyne's living quarters?" Papyrus asked.

I blinked at him, eyes glazing over Undyne's House of Horrors again. "It's very...subtle." _If you spelled "subtle" o-b-v-i-o-u-s._ "Looks like something that would explode out of that pink slop you call a brain," I teased.

"Fitting, as it was my pink slop which meticulously crafted the magnificent design!"

"Why am I not surprised?" I looked over the shack again, half-expecting it to lurch forward and tear my head from my neck. _Real ugly place to live. Never did take Papyrus for much of an architecture guy._ "And she's in there already?"

Papyrus nodded vigorously. "Indeed!"

"Wonderful," I sighed. The jaws of Undyne's home barred their jagged edges at me, challenging me to struggle between them while they snapped and pulled at my flesh. _Weird design for a door, but then again the rest of the place already looks like an abandoned theater set._ "Lets get this over with..."

"Human, I would greatly appreciate it if you took a bit of a different attitude in with you," Papyrus chastised, a hopeful expression on his face. "Perhaps one with a little more positivity?"

 _Now he's starting to sound like Tori._ I grinned wickedly at him. "Gee, I love making new friends! Almost as much as I love getting thrown off cliffs and stabbed between the ribcage!"

"...No, seriously though."

"Fine, sheesh." _You know things are about to get heavy when even Papyrus is level headed._ I slid out of the way and gestured to the door. "After you."

Papyrus brought his gloved hand up to knock, hesitating mid swing. "Oh, I almost forgot!" He reached into his pocket and pulled out an old dog bone, chunks of it missing and the marrow rotted yellow as an ear of corn, and handed it to me eagerly. Bright red gift wrapping straddled its midsection. "Be sure to give this to her as a gift. Undyne loves these!"

"...She does?" I muttered, making the wise choice to hold it by the wrapping. _I'm sure there's some kind of vulgar joke to make here involving Undyne and boners, but I'm just not seeing it._ Reluctantly, I tucked it into my jacket pocket. "Thanks for the help?"

He nodded fiercely, facing the door and halting for the second time. There were already flurries of rushed movements on the other side of the door, shadows shifting just out of view, some clattering of stuff and junk being tossed around and noisily rearranged, accompanied by one muffled but clearly audible, "Fuck!" When the skeleton finally mustered the courage to knock, all of the commotion stopped at once, as if Paps had shouted "Police, Open Up!" and shoved a search warrant up against the glass. "Just a second!" the voice came again, sickly sweet like an old bottle of maple syrup, barely recognizable as the Captain of the Royal Guard's. _But it's her, alright._

The top and bottom jaws pulled apart with an odd metallic twang, and the stench of rotten fish permeated the air. Undyne stood in the doorway, grinning gill-to-gill as if the world were about to end, a near mirror image of the house itself. "Papyrus, human...welcome to my home!" she sang, her voice dripping with venom she wasn't talented enough to conceal, or she hadn't bothered to try. She had traded her set of armor for a tank top black as her soul and a pair of icy blue jeans, no doubt matching the color of her heart. Her attire fit tightly around her muscular body, although she seemed a lot thinner than I had imagined underneath the bulk of her armor. I was startled to find she stood at nearly the exact same height as myself, and her one good eye bore directly into mine with poorly masked loathing. It only took a moment for heart to begin leaping up into my throat, tugging me away from the scene. _Well she seems...anxious to see me again._

I glanced sideways at Papyrus, who stared back, eagerly anticipating how I would return the greeting. Spitting in her eye didn't sound like such a bad choice, had the circumstances been any different. "Um...glad to be here," I muttered, ignoring our mutual wish to sling our arms around each other's necks. "Thanks for inviting me?" Through my nervous stutter, it came out more like a question.

"No...problem!" she managed to grunt, pausing between each word as though they lit her tongue aflame. Her lips never parted from their writhing, twitching smile, each word hissing through the spaces between her teeth while she ground them together. "Why don't. You two. Come in?"

"We would be honored to," Papyrus beamed. Undyne stepped aside to let us through, casually trailing a leg behind in a pathetic attempt to trip me up. Despite my better judgement, otherwise known as the little voice in my head that was the only thing in existence still making sense, I carefully stepped over her leg and entered without the slightest rebuttal. Papyrus wasn't so lucky. He got caught on Undyne and stumbled into me, crashing face-first onto the floor.

"Papyrus!" Undyne began, "are you-"

"No need to worry," he declared, leaping to his feet. "The Great Papyrus is unharmed...mostly."

"Sorry about that." Her robotic smile crept back onto her face. "It was..."

 _Meant for someone else_ , I finished for her.

The interior was hardly anything classy, and even less so fitting of the bold outer shell. The foyer was small, lined with light blue wall paper dotted with little pink fish that clashed against the scuffed and faded checkerboard tiles. Anything useful was pushed against the far wall: A few counters, a stove, a fridge, nothing to write home about. The only stand-out piece of furniture was the grand piano sitting against the corner, slick and black as oil and free of any dust or grime, an oddity among Undyne's possessions. It was obvious she had been hastily throwing things around in an attempt to make the room presentable. The rest was cluttered with junk, ranging from a giant foam sword flopping against the floor, to an identical...much sharper-looking sword beside it.

"Um...Undyne?" Papyrus spoke up, "Could you perchance remove that rather frightening weapon from the premises? I believe it may be making your other guest...nervous."

 _No kidding, I'm sweating bullets over here._ "I second that."

"Oh, of course." Undyne grabbed the weapon by the hilt and started dragging its edge against the flooring with a screech bitter and loud enough to silence the streets of an entire city. She brought it out into another room where the awful sound grew muffled.

Papyrus took her brief absence as an opportunity to nudge my shoulder. "Don't forget the gift I gave you, human," he whispered, winking without a hint of subtlety.

"How could I? Thing stinks even worse than the damn house." It came as no shock that Undyne's pad reeked of week-old sushi, but that didn't make bearing the salty, soured stench any easier. "Clearly Fish Lips's never heard of spring cleaning. Or a mop. Or soap. Or-"

"-Perhaps you should save your constructive criticism for a later encounter!" Papyrus urged. "The Great Papyrus won't be here much longer to aide you, so you must mind your tongue!"

"What? Why won't you—"

Undyne stomped back into the room and slammed the door shut behind her, interrupting our innocent conspiring. She sucked in a lungful of her vile air and croaked out a, "Can I...get you two anything?"

I bit back a sigh and held the "gift" out to her, practically choking on its stench. "Actually, I picked something nice up for you, Fish Li...I mean, Undyne."

It was hard to tell through my watery eyes, but I was confident Undyne's look of disgust had grown more severe. "Oh, how...wonderful! I'll just...put it with the others." She made a show of slowly creeping open the nearest cupboard, as though any more force would yank the door right off the hinges. It gave me a good look of the mountain of bones rotting beneath it, all wrapped in the same indistinguishable red bow. She tossed in the newest addition to decay with the others and violently slammed the cabinet shut.

"Glad you like it," I gulped, sneaking a glare at Papyrus, who continued to smile his usual, unknowing smile. "You've got a pretty nice place here," I ventured. "I like your...piano..."

"So do I," was all she said in response, gutting the conversation with a knife.

The next thirty seconds passed with a silence that only dragged out the time longer, smearing it across the floor and the walls and blending it with that awful, acrid stink of fish and bones. I had half a mind to smear the back of my own head against the wall too, internally pleading for something to explode, or for one of us to drop dead, or even just a single breath of fresh air. Undyne's snake-eyed glare, the desire to escape, my muddied senses, all of it melded together to form a sword at my gut that dug deeper and deeper in, until nausea took over my system and the process began again. _How could this get any worse?_ I wondered stupidly, doubts clouding my thoughts. _Why did I think listening to Papyrus was a good idea? Why-_

"-Whoopsy Doopsy!" Papyrus had cried out suddenly. Undyne and I fixed our attention away from each other for a brief moment to stare at the skeleton. "I just remembered I left the stove on this entire time! My spaghetti will burn!"

"Wait-" I reached out to grab him, but he was already far away from my grasp and sprinting in the opposite direction. Panic, and even more so confusion flared up in me at the thought of being left alone with the defender of justice/psychotic murderer. "Dammit Papyrus, this wasn't part of the god damn pl-"

An ear-rupturing shatter drowned out my cries as Papyrus threw himself at Undyne's only ground level window. He smashed right through the glass and tumbled out to the other side, graceful as a one-legged dancer. He left nothing but a trail of broken shards in his wake. I stared at the scene dumbfounded, each part of my body refusing to function. _Apparently, The Great Papyrus thinks he's above using doors._

"Tch. Usually he sticks the landing..."

I spun around, reminded of the knight's presence. She had dropped the fake grin in exchange for a more typical scowl, her arms crossed over her chest in boredom.

"I take it this happens a lot?" I asked, no longer surprised after the initial shock had fizzled out. Undyne ignored me, taking long strides over to her fridge, fishing out what looked to be a soda can, cracked it open effortlessly and plopped herself down beside the hard wood table. While she casually (and loudly) sipped at her drink, I studied her carefully, wondering if she was waiting for me to say something, or pretending I had vanished along with the skeleton and was waiting for me to get up and leave. Stubbornness festered among the already confused mixture of emotions. I wouldn't let the knight have the satisfaction of watching me walk out the door. Instead I strolled over to the chair across from her, sat myself down and threw my feet up on the table.

Finally, she sighed, turning her razor sharp glare towards me. "What? Still here to rub your victory in my face?" She went to take another swig, but came up disappointed. She had somehow already downed the entire can, crushing it between her fingers. "And get your filthy fuckin' feet off my table."

I made no effort to move. The gaping window allowed some slightly fresher air into the room, and my confidence rose with it. "First of all, my feet aren't fucking anyone. Not really interested in an intimate relationship right now," I snickered. "Second of all, I didn't make the damn hike all the way back to this rotted shit-hole just to gloat. I came here to...make amends for our past disagreements." It nearly tore a hole in my chest to spit out.

"Spare me your lies. You've clearly already spared me your damn formalities," she hissed, staring at my shoes intensely enough to melt them. "You humiliated me, you denied the Underground its justice, its hopes and its dreams...and you interrupted what should have been my one-on-one training time with Papyrus. I. Don't. Want you here, you pathetic excuse for a living creature."

I sighed, tucking my legs underneath the table. "Look, I'm just as excited about the whole idea as you, but I'm even less excited at the sentiment of us tearing at each others' throats again." _Or at least you at mine_. "Besides, if I leave here just as bitter as before, Papyrus won't ever let us hear the end of it. So let's just sit down like a couple of civilized adults," _which neither of us come close to qualifying as_ , "and...learn to play nice, I guess."

Undyne dropped her gaze the floor, at last choosing to think the matter over, using more brain power I thought she had. Our mutual desire to keep Papyrus happy, or at least blissfully ignorant, seemed to be the only thing we shared, but it would have to be enough on its own to convince her. Unless...

"You know what, it's fine. Can't blame a guy for trying," I sighed, sluggishly going through the motions of getting up and clearing out, watching for some kind of reaction. "I guess you're just not up to the challenge."

Her fist trembled and ruptured the wood as she brought it down against the table, even before the last ship had sailed from my mouth. I had known she couldn't resist the bait hanging from the lure. Undyne may not have been a moron, but she proved predicatively obstinate and artless as a boulder. _And believe me, I should know how stubborn those things can be._ "I've never backed down from a challenge!" she barked, fire lashing from her tongue. A wicked grin eased onto her face, somehow less chilling than her fake one. "Alright bestie, lets see if you're as big a coward as I think you are."

 _Welp, now that I've got her where I want her, might as well have some fun._ "Guess you're stuck with me then, ya big hypocrite," I shot back, cheerful as a kid in an aquarium.

She blinked, her face falling. "Bastard," she muttered, so low it was near incoherent.

"As if I needed a reminder, Cyclops," I added.

"Scum-smear."

"Cock shriveler."

"Elephant shit!"

"Cactus fucker!"

"Cactus what?!"

"You heard me." I shrugged. "Can you really blame me for the comparison? Takes a...special kind of bond to produce someone so prickly."

She just about smashed another hole in the table. "Why you little-"

"-Hey," I threw up my hands in mock defense, "I'm not insinuating anything, just suggesting that _someone_ around here clearly got a little too eager to try new things and ended up all touchy-feely with a very special cactus. I mean, whatever you're into sister, I don't judge. Much."

I half expected her to tear my throat out right then and there from the stabbing look she gave me, but she never lunged for it. _Wait, what did I come here to do again? Make Undyne less inclined to kill me? Whoops._ Rather than skewering me on the spot, she painstakingly rose from her seat and stomped to the counter top. "Care for something to drink, bestie?"

"So long as it's not poisoned."

"No promises!" she chirped, retrieving a stack a colored boxes from a nearby drawer. She set them down beside the stove and grabbed a kennel, filling it to the brim with water. _Tea, huh? Not what I would've ordered, but at least it'd be hard to slip something in without me noticing._

While she prepared our drinks, my gaze drifted over to the piano in the corner for more than the second time. "You actually know how to play that thing?"

"Nah, I just keep the damn thing lying around so people don't realize I'm a talent-less, hobbie-less loser. Of course I can play it!" She never so much as glanced up from the kennel as she spoke.

"Think you could lay something down for me once you're finished with that tea?"

"In your dreams, runt. But if it's music you want, I could always tear out your ribcage and play it for a xylophone!"

I clicked my tongue. "Think I'll have to pass on that offer."

The tea was served steaming at temperatures rivaling the surface of the sun, yet Undyne had downed half her cup in the same time it took me to pry open a bottle of honey. Tea was already beyond unbearable by its own merits; having it searingly hot enough to melt off the tip of my tongue was just the icing on the cake. Even after destroying the water and herbs in a syrupy torrent of honey, I struggled to make a dent in the glass, forcing the tiniest of sips down my throat as though Undyne really had found the time to poison the drink. All the while my hostess eyed me with obvious contempt, scowl clear on her face but her eyes shining with amusement, watching the bumbling of a crash-landed alien.

"How bout' you save me the trouble and ask for a damn bowl of honey next time." Undyne sneered, still jumping back and forth from her "pleasant" persona and the stubborn drill sergeant we all knew and love.

"Wouldn't have to use so much if you hadn't made the tea bitter as your attitude. And go easy on the heat! Stuff's hot enough for blacksmiths to forge with."

Undyne flashed me an incredulous look. "It's tea, best buddy. It's _supposed_ to be ragingly hot. Helps calm the nerves and relax the muscles after a rigorous training sesh." She poured near half of her own cup down her throat to demonstrate. "What, do they not have tea where you come from?"

"'Course we do, I just prefer my drinks to be...you know, drinkable?"

"Wimp."

 _Well, isn't this charming. By mid afternoon we'll be frolicking through Snowdin, holding hands and singing out of tune Christmas carols._

"Is this how monsters always makes friends?" I asked, giving up and setting the cup down. "Toss insults at each other until everything's magically all peachy?"

"Pretty much," she shrugged. I must have been losing my sanity, because it sounded as if she had uttered a direct response for once. "That's how I managed it, anyway. Not so different from your kind, right?"

"Hell if I know. I've always been terrible at that kind of stuff." I couldn't begin to name a solitary soul back home close enough to be considered a "friend." Made me start thinking about the skeleton brothers and Monster Kid, and to some extent Tori and the more auspicious of Snowdin's residents. The sheer amount of people who had somehow ended up on my good side, against all odds. "Guess I've gotten pretty lucky down here in that regard."

Undyne slurped up the last of her beverage and sighed. "Luck's been in pretty short supply around here lately. Not that I've ever needed it," she added quickly, defending dignity which wasn't in question. "Unlike some people..."

My temper flared. "Hey, this whole experience hasn't exactly been a lovely tour of the Underground! Every other person I've met has tried to butcher, skewer, occasionally wash, or otherwise maim me."

"So what brought you down here in the first place, bestie?" she challenged. "Curiosity? Greed? Blood lust? Or are you just that stupid?"

I made an attempt to fire back at her, but choked on the words. My thoughts had all of a sudden turned sluggish, as though they were slogging through water up to their knees. "You know, my um...I've been a little foggy about how exactly I got here." _More like a jumbled mess._ Avoiding the question entirely would only give her cause to think even less of me, so I chose to throw her a bone. "I may or may not have been trying to off myself, I honestly can't remember."

That little nugget of information clumped in the space between us for an uncomfortably long time. That is, until it was dispersed by Undyne's abrupt snort of laughter. "Ha! That's rich coming from you, chump!"

I stared at her blankly, stunned by her unsuspected outburst, feeling my face grow heated. "Didn't take you as someone who'd find potential suicide funny," I told her coldly, unsure of what I should have been expecting.

"No, it's not that," she insisted, though the laughter hadn't quieted. Eventually she regained her composure enough to speak. "You fight pretty hard for someone with a death wish. I don't buy that crap for a second."

 _Wow, that could almost be phrased as a compliment._ A new ray of confidence shone on me, and I managed a genuine smile. "That's fair. I still don't believe you can play a single piano chord."

"I ain't playing for you, kid."

I shrugged. "Was worth a shot."

Undyne tipped her chair back and balanced on the back two pegs while I mustered up the courage to down the rest of my tea. After getting past the burns, the bittersweet taste of it left a tingling sensation on my taste buds. "Not gonna lie, this actually isn't half bad. As far as tea goes, anyway," I admitted. "What flavor is this?"

"I knew you'd like it," Undyne said smugly. "Nothing but the best for my _absolutely precious friend!_ " Against every law of nature I could think of, Undyne and I had converged on some sort of a conversation, and even shared a chuckle. While it was a nice break from the vapid events to proceed it, it wasn't meant to last. I quickly reminded myself of the horrors the knight had forced me through, of her indifference towards whether or not Monster Kid lived or died, and sealed my lips shut. Undyne seemed to come to a similar revelation, silencing herself moments after. "Oh. Um, that's golden flower tea. It's, uh...it's Asgore's favorite kind."

I frowned at the names. "The head honcho himself, huh?" _All of a sudden_ , _I don't feel like asking for seconds._

"The one and only," she sighed, a sad smile tracing her lips. It disappeared almost immediately, covered by a familiar look of hostility. "If you've got something to share, bestie, at least be a man about it."

"Well, I don't, so quit hounding me about it." I hesitated, knowing I should just bite my tongue and hold my breath, but feeling unable to keep quiet. "I just...don't see what's respectable or honorable about some douchey monarch authorizing and supporting the _murder_ of children," I spat the end of it, unable to bit my tongue any longer.

I wasn't sure exactly what to expect as a response, but whatever it was, I hadn't guessed right. A look of raw, unbridled fury washed over Undyne's face like a tidal wave. Her single eye stared black as a pair of coals against a burning, luminescent sun, her hair a wild, fiery red tornado. She leaned forward and grabbed the edges of the table hard enough to crush them, brought herself mere inches from my face...and just as her mouth opened to berate me with flames, her face fell and dimmed and she dropped back in her chair, scowling. "It's more complicated than that," she said, rubbing her bare shoulder with an uncharacteristic sheepishness.

"Really? 'Cause 'don't kill children' seems like a pretty simple moral decision to me."

"How about 'don't sit back and watch your loyal subjects suffer?' That idea too complex for you to handle?" Her voice rang hard and sharp as the crashing of a gong, seeming to vibrate through the air long afterwards. "You know we don't just do what we do for fun."

"Oh, you're trying to say you don't get a kick out of it?" My mind was racing like a shuttle with no breaks, and I vaguely noticed myself leaping out of my own chair. "Is that why you dropped me off a bridge, letting me writhe in my mess of a body instead of ending it quickly? Is that why you _ignored_ a fellow monster hanging by a thread for his life?" I saw that fire sting her eye a second time, more subdued than before but gaining fuel fast. "What kind of _guard_ are you, anyway, if not their damned lives? Should be called the Royal Executioners."

"Shut your damn mouth before I tear your tongue out and feed it to a moldsmal!" She rose up for a second time to meet me. "You've got no idea what you're babbling about!"

"No idea? Lady, I've seen it first hand!" The last thought on my mind was how she might attack me for my outburst. I was engulfed in the heat of the moment. "All you do is bitch and moan about protecting the hopes and dreams of others and preserving justice, when you don't even understand the meaning of the words! You and you're psychotic king-"

"-SHUT UP!"

In a fraction of a second, a fresh blue spear crashed through the center of the table, collapsing it instantly. I brought my arms up and watched the splintering wood soar through the air and scatter across the floor, bounce against my sleeves, eventually settling like dust after a storm. The initial pang of shock threw off my system; I couldn't believe I had pushed her over the edge so easily. I waited for some sort of follow up attack, staring at the knight from the other side of the carnage, breathing heavily, but she made no such move. Instead she spun on her heels and stalked off towards the window, literally shaking in her rage, gawking off into nothingness with her back to me.

"...I shouldn't have forced you to suffer," she shuddered after what felt like hours. I started to lower my guard, no less stunned than before. "And I should have helped that kid when I had the chance." The spear vanished as she chose to face me again, meeting my gaze directly. "Both were inexcusable acts of cowardice that betrayed what myself and the rest of the Royal Guard stands for. By these mistakes, and the mistake of letting you live, I have failed in my duties as a knight. I'm sorry." She uttered the last part so faintly that the world had to be still just to hear it. As quick as the revelation came, her temerity resurfaced in the blink of an eye. "There, is that what you wanted to hear, bestie?"

My mind went blank trying to comprehend her apology, perturbed by its genuine nature. I couldn't figure how to react. "...Uh...yes, actually, that's _exactly_ what I wanted to hear now that I think about it," I said, feigning confidence. While Undyne's guilt appeared authentic, it wasn't enough to convince me to forgive her, if I even wanted to, or if she deserved it. _Those wounds are still too red and raw._ "Apology accepted."

"Oh gee, now my heart is finally at peace," Undyne sneered, but with less ferocity than before. "Thank you, my _dearest_ friend."

"You're welcome."

"I was being facetious."

"Right," I nodded, brushing off the debris peppering my seat and taking it at the shattered table.

"...This is the part where you apologize too, kid."

"Really? Shoot, I must have forgotten! Oh well."

"You still don't get it, do you?" she sighed, shaking her head. For the millionth time I wanted to walk right out her misshapen door and spit on the carpet for good fortune. _We're not getting anywhere_ _with this crap_. The two of us were water and oil, Summer and Winter, incompatible aside from our shared stubbornness. _Might as well be driving in reverse off a cliff._

My thoughts were brushed off easy as dust from the sound of three simple piano chords, flowing light and solemn as a patter of raindrops. Undyne had her fingers resting on the keys, fixated on them. "Do you know why I joined the Royal Guard?" she asked.

"...No, but I'd bet it didn't have a whole lot to do with playing piano."

She opened and closed her mouth in a failed rebuttal. "Okay, not really-just shut up and listen to the story, okay?!" she snapped.

"Fine."

Undyne cleared her throat and took her place leaning beside the graceful instrument, watching me intently but trailing one hand on the keyboard. "Y'know, I was a pretty hotheaded kid. 'Grew up in the inner city, packed in with just about everyone else I knew. Plenty of people to piss off and get in fights with. Parents signed me up for piano lessons to try and keep me out of trouble, maybe they were hoping I'd mellow out." Her fingers began to dance along the keys, recalling a simple melody without eyes showing them what to do. She must have noticed my gawking, because she smirked at me. "It didn't work of course, but I learned a few tricks. Damn lessons actually helped out with my precision and timing, for what they were worth.

"Long story short, I had built up a reputation as the tough girl in town. Every chump on the streets would start shaking in their boots when I rolled up, and I was barely older than a guppy!" Her voice lowered, and the notes came a bit slower than before. "Once, to prove I was the strongest monster alive, I tried to fight Asgore. Emphasis on _tried_ ," she scoffed, ending the tune abruptly with a loud, harsh pang. She made an over exaggerated motion of collapsing onto the piano bench, feet kicked up in the air as if she were jumping from a swing. "I couldn't land a single blow on him!" She clenched the edges of the seat hard enough for the wood to crackle beneath her.

"Seems like you're taking it well." I relaxed in my chair, pretending not to care about her story. "Is there a point to any of this?"

"I never open my big mouth unless I've got a point to make," she said flatly, eyeballing me until I looked focused enough to listen. "It doesn't weigh on me now, but back then, I was crushed. The worst of it was, that whole time I was swinging at him, he _refused_ to fight back! It was beyond humiliating..."

 _It doesn't weigh on you, and yet you're hunched over half-way to the floor staring at your shoes. Keep up the sob story, and you might get lucky and strike a cord with me._

"Afterwards, he apologized and said something goofy..." She continued in an impression that sounded somehow larger than life, yet meek and understanding all at the same time. "'Excuse me, do you want to know how to beat me?' I said yes, and from then on, he trained me." That very slight smile reappeared, thin as a paper cut. "One day, during practice, I finally knocked him down. I felt...stunned, as if I had toppled a living giant. But he was beaming!" By then, she was back to grinning like a lunatic. "I had never seen someone more proud to get their ass handed to them."

That, admittedly, made me chuckle a bit. Undyne seemed glad to see me showing the slightest bit of enthusiasm in her story, pumping her fist in the air triumphantly. "Anyway, long story short, he kept training me. And now, I'm the head of the Royal Guard!"

I nodded, urging her to continue, but her expression and the extended pause told me she had nothing more to add. "Alright, so...cute story and all, but where's that point you were subtlety advertising?"

Undyne returned the question the same way she responded to half the crap that leaves my mouth: an empty stare that filled steadily with irritation for each millisecond that passed. "Are you serious?"

"Would I be willingly asking you to talk my ears off even more if I wasn't?"

"Good point. How the hell do I explain this?" She jumped to her feet, pacing around the room and tugging at her pony tail as if the motion could jump-start and mitigate her thought process. I silently wished for another cup of tea to kill the time with, not willing to disrupt her and pop her little thinking bubble. "Gah, usually I just yell at people until they accept what I say as fact and be done with it! Course I'm not used to dealing with stubborn jackasses like you..."

"So that attitude's just for show, then?" _Dammit, couldn't resist._

Undyne pretended not to hear me, to the benefit of us both. Hardly a breath later and her eye lit up in realization. She rooted herself in place and turn to me with a look of satisfaction that came only from a revelation of unfathomable grandeur. "My drive."

A stillness allowed her input to sink in. "...'Kay, how about we try that again, but with an actual string of thought attached to it this time, maybe?"

"No! Ugh, quit it before I pin your lips shut. With a _spear_." I rolled my eyes at her wisp of a threat, but quieted. "Look, I used to be a punk-ass kid like you. Had nothing better to do than pick fights, get into trouble, and worry about the only friends worth keeping around: Me, myself, and I. But King Asgore saw some potential in me, like a...like a match that hadn't been struck. He told me once, 'if you fight for nothing but yourself, you will only ever see the force of an individual. Fight for others, and one day you will witness the strength and unity of a nation.'" She clutched her chest with meek sentimentally at the memory, a stark contrast to the intensity in her voice. "That day forward, I trained to protect my people along with the dreams they shared. And, you may have noticed, most of those desires involve climbing out of this hell hole and paying the old sun and stars a visit." Her glare turned accusatory, turning the spotlight back to me. "What about you, human? Anything motivate you, get you out of bed in the morning? Unless you're nothing but a hollow sack of bones underneath all that sarcasm and swagger."

I decided to entertain the thought, if even for a moment, recalling the echoed voices portrayed by the flowers in Waterfall—two monsters wishing upon a makeshift set of stars for just a glance at the real thing. My mind drifted to the sad smiles of the monsters I passed in Snowdin: the shopkeeper's thin veil of cheery hope masking her pessimistic attitude, the guard dogs' persistence in their efforts to slay me and return to the surface, and especially the snowman whom a piece of still remained tucked away in my pocket. Each of them with nowhere to go, their hope stretched thin and eventually smothered like dying candlelight after who-knows-how-long of being trapped underground. Initially I tried to distance myself from them emotionally, save for the snowman; now the similarities between my situation and theirs' seemed so obvious, I wondered how I could have been so dense as to miss them in the first place.

"I guess it's not so different from what the monsters down here want. I'm just looking for something more than what's right in front of my face. Although that must sound pretty selfish coming from someone in my position, huh?"

"...Exactly?" Undyne seemed at a brief loss for words, as though a similar thought process to my own was steadily clicking into place for her. She furrowed her brow in contemplation, then curled her lip in disgust, which softened into a look of distress and concern, all in the span of nearly three seconds. "Dammit, kid," she cursed, curling her hand into a fist. "I wanted to believe for so long that you and the rest of humanity were a bunch of senseless killers, that only beings drained and starved of any compassion or sympathy could do such horrible things. Waging wars out of spite and fear, sealing thousands of living beings underground to rot for centuries upon centuries...the list of sins goes on and on. But if even punks like you have the slightest bit of heart..." She eyed me with a new easiness in her stare. "I guess it never really was that simple to begin with. My sights were so set and locked on liberating my people, It hadn't occurred to me that humans had their own stream of shit to figure out."

After her speech, I saw Undyne differently than I had a moment before. She was no longer the self-righteous extremist I imagined her as, and something closer to the radiant hero Monster Kid and others proclaimed her to be. Suddenly it wasn't so hard to see how inspiring her beacon of spirit and strength must have been in a dark, hopeless pit of a world. _Even if she still is a bit of an ass._ "Yeah, I haven't exactly been bursting with compassion myself. Then again, that would be—"

"—A bit too out of character for you," Undyne finished my sentence for me obnoxiously. Noticing my irritated frown, she added, "What can I say, I've had to tolerate your sorry ass for so long, nothing you say is clever or surprising anymore."

"And I'd bet my head would explode if you uttered one more word about 'justice.'"

"Probably," she agreed, and we shared a chuckle. Or at least, I chuckled. Undyne chortled like it was the funniest damn thing in the world to her, tossing her head back so far it threatened to roll right off her neck. She recollected herself and said, "Don't get too excited just because I decided to let you live, chump."

I shook my head. "I'm the one sparing you here, remember?"

"Of course I remember. It only happened five hours ago," she mumbled reluctantly, more vacant than she had been a moment before but still with a small smile. A word slipped from between her lips so quickly it was difficult to process. "Thanks." She folded her arms and glowered at me. "There, I said it, no need to keep sitting around waiting for me to spout some shit."

That hadn't been what I was waiting for, if anything at all, and by this point I had long since deemed any sort of appreciation or genuine praise from Undyne an impossibility. Not only did it feel unexpected, but also unnecessary; consciously, I never even desired for her to mollify the tension between us, let alone acknowledge the very reason we were allowed the chance to in the first place. This whole scenario felt like being dragged to a performance you didn't want to attend with people you'd rather stab than converse with, and no part of me had cared. But something had changed, shifted and clicked into place, and now the sentiment tasted sweeter than it would have a mere hour before. "Implying that I've been drooling at your feet for affection like a mutt," I said, feigning annoyance. "Or Papyrus." Despite my bitter tone, I willingly returned her smile, with fifty percent less irony than it contained before.

"Speaking of Papyrus..." She threw a glance up at her wall clock. "Dammit, he was supposed to be back here for his cooking lesson ten minutes ago!"

 _Cooking lessons? I mean, he needs those more desperately than therapy, but from Undyne? That'd be like receiving advanced combat tutorials from a world-class chef._ "Is...is that a huge deal?"

"Yes!" she yelled, as though that were obvious. "I've been teaching him for months without a _single_ missed lesson! And if he's gonna blow me off..." A terrifying looking of mischievousness crossed her lips, one that wouldn't be out of place on a comic-book super villain. "C'mon, you're taking his lesson for him."

"What? Why would I want—"

"—To commemorate our new...fr...fre...friedsh...frnd...acquaintanceship! It'll be like a team building exercise!"

"I've always hated those. And cooking."

"Don't care!" She grabbed me by the elbow and practically dragged me out of my chair towards her stove. _Well, I guess being forced into menial cooking exercises by someone you tolerate beats being under the sharp end of a spear by someone you despise. Not by much, but a little. Cooking with Undyne can't be_ that _complicated anyway, right...?_


	27. Chapter 27: Rekindling

_Heat. Flames. Everything is burning, thick black smoke poisoning my lungs. Feels like I'm trapped, suffocating from the inside of an oven._

 _An oven..._

I drifted awake, the aggressive heat deserting me in favor of a gentle, homely warmth. A confused mess of shock and familiarity plagued my senses, until I came to recognize my surroundings as the skeleton brothers' house. It hadn't been a place I was expecting to visit again, especially not under such eerily similar circumstances as the first time. Drenched in an obnoxious sheen of sweat and with a thick wool blanket draped over me, I pushed myself up off the only somewhat grimy couch, freshly cleaned since my last equally willful visit, and had a groggy look around.

Everything stood as it had before, a simple yet inviting set of furniture resting on a fuzzy blue and purple carpet with a wavy pattern like an ocean current. A sleeping bag sprawled against the floor as an island in the center of the sea, stuffed with something vaguely human-shaped, accompanied by a bob of red hair flopping out from the top. I flinched as it shifted and grumbled, feeling a flash of panic grow and tug at my heartstrings as I recognized the figure inside. Once it had finally given up on making itself comfortable, the body rolled over and locked its one eye on mine lazily.

"Morning, kid," Undyne said unceremoniously, forcing herself further out of her bag as though we were racing to see who could get up first.

My concern faded when my head started to lighten, and the memories of the previous night resurfaced. Our aggression had been more or less resolved, traded for a sort of understanding that allowed me to look on the knight with something besides disgust. I sighed in relief, all of a suddenly extremely thankful for having one less person out to get me in the Underground. Surprisingly, that wasn't what was bothering me. "Morning, your graciousness," I mumbled, sliding off the couch and onto a pair of half-asleep legs. "How the hell did we wind up back here? I don't remember leaving your place...last..."

"You don't remember our damned _evacuation_?" Undyne asked, but I had barely been listening; I was now wide awake and intently focused on the bright red burn marks along my fingertips, palms and forearms, vaguely aware of the slight stinging sensation in those areas. The memory that had been alluding me became vivid as the scorch on my skin.

Undyne had dragged me into her cooking lesson intended for Papyrus, sort of as a "team bonding exercise" as she put it. What she _hadn't_ prepared me for was the most terrifying and excruciating five minutes of my entire life—including the last three days of multiple, strenuous near-death experiences.

* * *

I should've been expecting her to take cooking to such an extreme degree as she did anything else, but I was too distracted by our bonding to even consider the situation. It wasn't until Undyne had leapt into the air and landed less than gracefully on her kitchen counter, violently flinging everything from tea boxes to glass bottles to their unfortunate fate on the floor, that I remembered how everyone and everything in the Underground was irrationally and perpetually insane.

The ever-stoic knight started her instruction by screaming, " _Nothing_ has brought Papyrus and I together like cooking! You and I are about to become closer than you can even _imagine_!" to her audience of one, a sneer of defiance potent on her face. "First, let's start with the sauce!" Undyne jumped and pounded the ground, knocking a colorful array of vegetables off the top of her fridge and onto the counter. "Envision these vegetables as your greatest enemy!"

"Envision who as what now?"

"NOW! Pound them to dust with your fists!" she cried, ignoring my relatively reasonable confusion.

It was around then that I began to question the decisions that had led me to smashing pumpkins and other veggies with the maniac who had been my mortal adversary fifteen minutes before, and was no better off for it. _"Who the hell am I supposed to 'envision' as the vegetables if not the fish?"_ I had thought. _"A damn moldsmall?"_

"I'm still not seeing any _pounding_!"

"Yeah, me neither," I said unconvincingly, trying to make light of what should've been an already benevolent activity. "Isn't there supposed to be a tool for this? Like a mallet or something-"

"-SLAM IT!"

My hand acted before my mind could, and the next thing I knew my forearms and face were splattered with the blood of my enemy: bright red tomato guts. At first I was appalled, but that feeling was quickly subverted for a bizarre sense of satisfaction, so much so that I hadn't noticed the bruise forming on my wrist bone. A grin spread across my face. "Okay, I admit it. That was pretty fun."

"Less talking, more cooking!" Undyne persisted, clearly unsatisfied with the lack of destruction. "Now, squash that pepper!"

I repeated the act until the counter top was drowned in vegetable juices. Undyne's enthusiasm was near intoxicating when she was the one cheering you on. When only a few veggies remained, she pumped her fist in excitement. "Yeah! Yeah! Our hearts are uniting against these healthy ingredients!"

"Hell yeah!" _Whatever that means._

"Now it's my turn!" She thrust her fist forward, empowered by a ferocious war cry, carrying enough force to blast through the unfortunate stragglers who met a gruesome fate against the back wall. I flinched backwards, but my excitement remained unperturbed. "Uh, we'll just scrape this into a bowl later…" Undyne said, scratching at the back of her head nervously. "But _for now_!"

She swept back over to the stove, tossing a silver pot full of water and a box of pasta beside it. "…We'll add the noodles. Homemade noodles are obviously the best. But I just buy _store-brand! Because they're the cheapest!"_

"As long as they aren't plastic, I couldn't give a damn! Let's throw these suckers in!"

Without paying even a hint of attention, I threw the pot on the stove and the noodles in as hard as I could. Including the box.

"Alright! I'm into it," Undyne cheered, teeth grinding together in a harsh grin. "Now it's time to stir the pasta." She handed me a simple wooden spoon, which I took without hesitation. "As a general rule of thumb: the harder you stir, the better it is!"

"I won't let you down!" I began twirling the spoon between the pasta shells in large, circular motions, tearing through the soupy mess of noodles and soaked cardboard at breakneck speeds. The spoon felt mighty as a greatsword and light as a feather in my hands, and the water seemed to crackle with energy as I stirred it. "Harder!" Undyne pushed my shoulders, encouraging me to stir faster. "HARDER!" Now the pot seemed a vortex, my brain unable to process the velocity of its contents. "Ugh, let me do it!"

I nearly jumped out of my skin as a spear came crashing into the pot from above, and again and again, until the pot was deformed nearly beyond recognition. After my shock faded, I transformed back into my uncharacteristically upbeat self. "That's one way to do it…"

"Wrong! That is the _only_ way to do it!" She sparkled with energy, possibly even more anxious than I was. "Now, for the final step. Time to _turn up the heat..._ Literally." Her rough gestures guided mine to the most powerful cooking instrument of all: the stovetop. "Let this symbolize passion! Let your hopes and dreams smolder into a raging fire! Don't hold _anything_ back!"

"Burn shit, don't be a pussy. Got it." I began to crank the knob to the right, feeling the heat of a small yellow flame begin to spread out from beneath the pot, crackling like autumn leaves underfoot. After a full rotation of the dial, which according to the markings was already farther than was intended, I glanced back to Undyne expectantly. "Can this thing even go any hotter?"

"What do you think this is, chump, playtime in little baby school? You can _always_ go hotter, kid! Time to take off the training wheels, turn that shit! Crank it till the dial falls off, and the whole room _erupts in flames_!"

I nodded vigorously, spinning the dial through its entire rotation over and over as if it were a top. With every second, the fire rose higher and higher, curling around the silver pot and reaching out towards the pair of us with open arms. I was practically delusional, ignorant to the growing danger as I literally played with fire. Undyne's intense and vivacious nature only prolonged my fixated happiness, until…until…

* * *

…Needless to say, Undyne had gotten her wish.

"…'crank it till the room erupts in flame?'"

"I didn't mean it literally! Sheesh, it's a wonder how you've survived so long when you're willing to do the most ridiculous shit anyone tells you," she grumbled, stretching her arms above her head in anything but a lax fashion. "If just _one_ of my guards had said, 'hey kid, don'tcha know there's treasure _just_ over that chasm—"

"Hey, excuse me for assuming you knew what you were talking about, oh great food guru!" I said. "…You know what, that may have actually been a mistake on my part."

"You think?" she sighed. "My entire damn house burned down. I had to half-carry your sorry ass back here with how exhausted you were, and to top it all off…I think I finally realized why Papyrus is such a terrible cook."

"Gee, what a life-changing revelation," I jeered. "A wonder you figured it out as soon as you did."

"I'd like to see _you_ try microwaving some goddamned instant noodles without so much as short-circuiting the entire power grid!"

"Listen up, fish li—"

"Human! Undyne! You are awake at last!"

Our quarreling was interrupted as a familiar skeleton burst onto the scene, appearing sudden and sporadically as ever. Under different, more chipper circumstances I might have returned Papyrus's infectious smile, but the familiar face still brightened my mood regardless. At the very least, he served his purpose well enough as a diffuser. His brashness chased away Undyne and I's feud like a watchdog's bark scaring off a pair of burglars. "The two of you had me worried sick!" he wailed, throwing up his hands in what might have been mock anguish, had it come from anyone else. A cooking apron flapped against his front, mimicking his surprise. "And here I thought leaving my two best friends, who also coincidentally happened to be mortal enemies, alone to bond was a foolproof plan!"

"'Foolproof?' No. But aside from Undyne's house charring worse than the pasta, that could've gone a lot worse."

" _Aside_ from that," Undyne snorted, glaring at Papyrus as though debating whether to thank him, demote him, or tear his arm bones right out of their sockets. She settled for something a bit less violent; delivering Papyrus the most furiously aggressive noogie ever to be ground into someone's skull.

"Ah! Oof! Undyne," Papyrus wailed, "you know I'm very sensitive there, _please_!"

"Too late for begging, Paps!" she cried back, showing no hints of slowing her assault on his cranium. "You're officially The Noogie Express's one and only passenger, and the conductor is thoroughly _pissed_!"

"But my behavior on public transportation is always that of a model citizen! My reputation is ruined! NOOOOO!"

"Hey, give the poor guy some credit; his stupid, convoluted, shit-storm of an idea sorta worked out for the best," I said, doing my best to rescue the poor skeleton.

"Are you out of your damned mind?" Undyne paused her massage from hell, holding Papyrus in a loose headlock before pushing him away with what only she would consider a playful shove. "Plans 'working out for the best,' don't end with _someone's house burning—"_

"Would either of my very special and hugely reformed pals care for a wonderful breakfast to staunch this incessant bickering?!" Papyrus said, gingerly rubbing the new dent carved in his head, eyes darting rapidly back and forth between us expectantly.

The room stood silent aside from our breathing. I met Papyrus's anxious black eye sockets, then Undyne's steely and unperturbed glare, and decided this wasn't an argument worth having. The knight's rage was well justified, for a first, and provoking her further wouldn't serve any more purpose than fulfilling my own amusement. I cleared the tension with a sigh and said, "Sure, depending on who's doing the cooking. Personally I'd rather go for take-out than anything you could conjure up out of your cauldron of a kitchen, Paps."

"Hmm…I suppose I could stoop so slow as to reheat leftovers from that _appalling_ restaurant Sans so badly adores. That is, if that truly is what you would prefer, human," the skeleton said, clicking his tongue in distaste.

"You mean Grillby's? Sorry Paps, but that shit's a solid five stars compared to your cooking." I leaned in away from Undyne and whispered, "seeing your 'teach' in action, I can't really say it's all your fault."

"I heard that," the knight muttered, shouldering her way into the kitchen without any pleasantries. "Count yourself lucky I crossed you off my 'to kill' list, buddy."

 _Likewise, Fish Lips._

Papyrus sat us down in his cramped kitchen space, and within minutes left us with some reheated fries and half a burger in each of our hands. We ate awkwardly, our eyes cast downward at the undecorated table as though it were something to be admired, and neither having much to say. I allowed myself the pleasure of a few relieved sighs as the magical food washed the burns from my skin. Even as sloppy leftovers, Grillby's cooking was something to be admired. _Wouldn't mind hosting a barbeque with the guy once this is all over._

"Would you quit it with your damn moaning over there?" Undyne interjected, glancing up for the first time. She had hardly raised a finger towards her platter. "Sounds like you've got something nasty going on under the table. And I don't wanna hear about it."

I raised another fry to my mouth dramatically, releasing the tension with a bite and an exaggerated moan. "Was that any better?"

"Stuff it, you little pervert," she said, flinging a fry of her own at my face. I quickly snatched it from the air and tossed it in my mouth.

"Gladly."

"Hmph." Ill-content, she leaned back in her chair and propped her feet up on the table, arms crossed lazily at her chest. Her eyes were defiant to meet mine while I looked her over. Seeing the once impervious, invincible, unshakable Undyne distraught and moping like a pet left outside in the rain shook me, started to dilute my good mood.

"Listen, Undyne, I, uh..." I scratched at the back of my head, mustering as much sympathy as I could. "I…It really sucks what happened, as much as I'm teasing you for it. I've never had a proper home like that. Can't imagine what it's like to lose it." _Can't I, though? Ebott could burn to the ground without so much as a letter bearing my regards, but if Tori's place went up in smoke? I'd be pretty crushed._

"I'll bet you couldn't." She looked at me with a sort of softness that betrayed her bitter tone. "But, I appreciate you saying that, kid. I'm a pretty tough cookie though, I'll survive just fine, like I always have. Besides, it's not all terrible. I managed to save my piano."

"How'd the hell you manage that while the place was coming down?" I asked curiously.

"Easy. I stuffed your lifeless body under one arm and carried the piano with my other. It's proudly gathering snowdust in Papyrus's shed right about now."

"You carried the entire thing with one arm? Remind me how I won our little fight again?"

Undyne awarded me a vehement grin the size of her inflated ego, making a shocking return. "A little skill, and a truckload of luck." Her fingers curled into a fist tingling with confidence. "If we ever find ourselves locked in battle again, you best believe I won't be so soft on you."

"Puh-lease! You fought like you were the damn messiah bringing reckoning to an entire race of weirdos, and I'd bet you believed it too! Pushed yourself any harder, and your veins would've imploded from the effort." I scratched at the back of my head, turning away from the knight. "Besides, I wouldn't want us to meet with weapons pointed at each other's throats again. That hatchet's already been buried, and I don't plan on unearthing it in this lifetime. 'Specially since I probably won't last long enough for us to get the chance anyway."

"Pleasant thought, kid," Undyne said with a chuckle. With a sideways glance, I caught her rolling her eyes. "Weren't you the one trying to lighten the mood a minute ago? You almost had me going for a second there, too."

I hid a smile. Now that she was more or less snapped out of her funk, I found I sorta liked talking to a bit more laid back version of Undyne's usual explosive self. "Really? Maybe I should try my hand at counseling, if I ever get out of here in one piece. Got any other issues on your mind you wanna discuss?"

"With you? Hell no." She snorted in laughter, a sound that, surprisingly, didn't make me retch with disgust. "Unless you stop talking like the world is about to end, do everyone else a favor and keep your ass _far_ away from counseling. Giving those kinds of hypocritical, despondent pep talks is more of a psychiatrist thing. That'd be more up your alley."

"Hmm…Come to think of it, I just hate hearing other people talk about their problems. Think I'll go for a different profession after all. So, um…What will you be doing in the meantime? With, you know, no house, and all."

Undyne sucked in some stagnant air and blew it out in a nonchalant puff. It was transparently clear she hadn't thought about it much. "I guess I'll be crashing here until I can figure something else out, assuming Papyrus doesn't mind. Safe bet he won't though. He seemed pretty chipper about the whole situation, being the lovable dunderhead that he is."

"Not much surprise there," I agreed. I couldn't imagine Undyne would be keen on mooching off of the skeleton brothers for very long; she had far too much stubborn pride to entertain the idea any longer than she had to. _She'll be on her feet by the end of the week._

"And, kid, one last thing before I let you totally off the hook." A sudden seriousness befell her tone, her stern and ominous gaze almost intimidating. I nodded to show her I was all ears. She continued in a low, sinister deliverance, "When you reach Asgore and make the climb out of here—and that _is_ a when, not an _if_ —I want you to scrape up the scummiest, most volatile, most despicable human being imaginable...and send him down here for me to deal with swiftly. I'd want a rematch with one of your kind, and that would make for a pretty short goodbye between us two, if you follow me."

"…Definitely would be," I muttered, thinking out my next words carefully. "As exciting as that sounds—believe me, I'd have a lottery's worth of choices—I think I have to run the whole idea through your king first. You know, to make sure he doesn't still plan on humanity's mass genocide. Small concern of mine, if you could understand."

She took a long moment thinking it over, her fingers rapping against the table in pace with her mind, seemingly thrown off by my answer. Eventually, she clicked her tongue. "I get'cha. Be pretty stupid to invite your sworn enemies through the front door without some terms and conditions."

"No, that's not…you aren't my 'sworn enemy,' or whatever, not anymore at least. I just—"

"I get it, kid," she interrupted, more stern than before. "You can't go trusting random creeps you haven't met before, not without a little convincing." She grinned haughtily at me again, with promise to dissipate the conflict. "I can promise you won't have to worry about ole' Fluffybuns, though: King or no, at the end of the day, he's a total weenie! Once we each get a chance to talk to him and convince him we won't have to fight, he'll be pissing himself with joy. He'll call off the attack faster than you can raise your little white flags in surrender."

"Right. Pretty sure no one uses those anymore, but I understand the sentiment." Something about the way she phrased her explanations still concerned me. _He'll call off an attack faster than you can surrender, almost as if…She can't trust humans yet_ , I came to realize, _and I can't trust the monsters._ It was a grim truth, but an obvious one we should've realized sooner. Undyne could guarantee nothing about what their leader, Asgore, might do when given the chance, no more than I could confirm how the people up north might react to the discovery of an entire intelligent race—and one that humans thoroughly pissed off, at that. _She at least works with the people in charge. I rank about as highly as a domestic pet in "my" society, and she knows it. So what should I say? Lie and lead her on with the prospect of a truce, or come clean and walk away?_ My head began to throb with the conflicting thoughts dashing each other across the walls of my skull.

 _Why was I drawn into the center of all of this? A couple of days ago, I couldn't care less who lived and who died, and now it feels like everyone's lives are weighing on my spine, bundled together like a slab of concrete blocks…_

"Guess we'll have to wait and hear the big guy's input," I said lamely, with a languid shrug of my shoulders. Forcing a smile, I added, "'til then, just know I'm totally on _your_ side, alright? No need to be so suspicious."

"Who, me? The hell you get that idea…" She cut herself off mid-sentence, throwing her arms nonchalantly in defeat. "Ah, who am I kidding? You caught me, nerd. I was skeptical, but _now_ I know you're too big a chicken to cross me." She said it lightly, by her standards anyway, so I could pick out its humorous intent.

"Sure, we'll go with that," I agreed. "And I know you wouldn't dare try anything crazy when your holy _justice_ is at stake, right Fish Lips?"

There was her laugh again, only a bit slower and more deliberate, as though she were reading from a script. "We're quite the pair of 'friends,' kid." After ignoring the food for several minutes, Undyne carelessly scooped up a fry in her left hand, extending the other towards me. "Seriously though, let's shake on it. No funny business between the two of us, got it?" Her tone suggested I hadn't a choice. _And I really don't, do I?_

"You drive a hard bargain," I joked, meeting her outstretched hand with mine. The handshake was warm and reassuring, even as the knight nearly pulled me out of my chair with her strength. "Shakes don't carry much weight where I come from, but you can have my word: that one was genuine."

Her arms and shoulders relaxed, and her smile returned. "I take it that doesn't mean shit, either."

"Not exactly sure myself. Haven't made many big-time promises before, let alone have to have kept 'em. As long as you're buying it, should be _pretty_ damn convincing."

"I've returned, and I've come to delicately deliver delectable desserts to my…delightful…friends!" Papyrus burst into the room accompanied by his well-natured cries, abruptly putting an end to our unorthodox negotiations. He drifted over to the table and plopped down a little white cardboard box, popping open the top to reveal a cluster of well decorated cupcakes. "Freshly purchased from a neighboring store with no input on my behalf!"

"Ooh, good call, Paps," I said, reaching for the nearest one, admiring the glossy sheen of light reflecting off the chocolate icing like the surface of the ocean.

"Well hot damn!" Undyne scooped up three or four in her arms, quickly going to town on them as though they were the last thing she'd ever eat. She managed to garble out something resembling speech in between scarfing the poor bastards down. "Keup thish uop, ahnb…" She forced the cupcake chunks down her throat in an inhumanly large swallow. "…and I'll have you promoted to Royal Guard status by the end of the week."

"Really?!"

"No. C'mon bonehead, I've told you before a million times: Being a Royal Guardsman is about more than just being a flowery, well-mannered, goody-two-shoes type," she scolded. "In fact, it's not about that. _At all_ , come to think of it." With her fist pumped heroically against her chest, she bellowed, "It's about being courageous, protecting the people who aren't strong enough to do so themselves, kicking obscene amounts of ass, and most importantly—

"—something, something, justice?" I ventured, excitedly taking a bite out of my own dessert. It tasted light and sweet, a nice contrast to the hearty and somewhat charred meal to come before it. I decided to hang out on the fringe of the conversation while I enjoyed the treat.

"See? Even the kid is starting to get it," she snickered, opening her shark-like jaws to chomp down on one last cupcake.

"But Undyne," Papyrus proceeded airily, striking a pose that served to hinder his argument as a joke, naturally. "How are we to protect the innocence of others without showing a good-hearted sense of compassion to our enemies? Otherwise, what makes us better than them? I say brutalizing charlatans and crooks in such a way is detrimental to the established goal of our troupe! Only by understanding wrongdoers can we prevent their misdeeds from occurring in the future!" The skeleton finished proudly, his posture suggesting he was waiting for some unseen audience to applaud him for completing a full thought on his own.

Undyne, meanwhile, stood in the wings, ready to boo him right off the stage. "I swear, Papyrus, you're too pure for your own good." She gave a less than amused glower and barked, "Now drop and give me twenty—and you'd better not keep me waiting for an _actual_ twenty minutes this time!"

"Yes, ma'am!" Papyrus dropped to the floor and began performing push-ups at a staggering rate of about one per minute. I pretended to look thoroughly engaged while eagerly chewing my sugary treat, my gaze following the skeleton's slim form flop on the tiles below us, watching his needle thin arms strain and sway with the weight above them, an ocean's worth of sweat running down his forehead. Although it was impossible to see, I used his constant grunts of varying pitches to paint a vivid image of his face contorted with the effort of supporting himself. "O-one…t-two…th-thr…whew, almost made that one. GAH, The Great Papyrus has lost count!"

"Ah hell, would you be done faster if I supported you?" the knight offered, though her mischievous grin betrayed the sincerity in her voice.

"Y-Yes, Undyne that would be most—Ack!"

I choked out a laugh and a few crumbs as Undyne threw herself over Papyrus's poor body, pinning him helplessly against the floor. The skeleton scrambled and clawed like an insect pinched between the fingers of his superior. His vain attempts to escape her clutches only made her cackle harder, so loud and pained it could've been mistaken as bawling. "C'mon ya big dork, tap into some of that upper body strength! There's gotta be _some_ hiding in those bones of yours!"

"U-Undyne, my battle body can only handle so much abuse!"

"And _my_ battle _brain_ can only handle so much whining!" She stepped off her lackey, the devious look in her eyes telling me she her teasing was far from over. "Now go run up and down your stairs until your legs are falling out of their sockets! Work on some cardio."

Papyrus wasted no time leaping to his feet and stammering out a, "Y-Yes, ma'am," along with a sloppy solute. He bolted from the room, the clatter of his footsteps against his staircase following soon after.

"Hard to believe that clown nearly kicked my ass when we fought." I reflected on the not so distant times, having finished the last of my cupcake.

"Are you kidding? He _has_ spent a lot of time training with the Underground's finest, after all," Undyne boasted, flexing her biceps obnoxiously. I rolled my eyes at her, but possessed little material to argue with. It was obvious she had been molding Papyrus into what she considered a semi-competent soldier for a good chunk of time. The duo acted close, in spite of Undyne's abrasive commands and Papyrus's airy naïvety. Their harsh differences is likely what made them so entertaining to watch, what made them fit so well together; Undyne needed a bit of lighthearted goofiness to dilute her stern nature, and Papyrus needed her gentle, nurturing…violent, thorny brevity so he could pop out from his own personal bubble every now and again.

"So what's the deal then?" I finally got around to asking. "If the guy's way tougher than he looks by a longshot, why hold him back from joining the R—"

"—Keep your voice down!" The next thing I knew, Undyne had lunged across the table and showed the palm of her handing into my face, holding my mouth closed. I struggled against her iron grip until I mustered enough strength to shove her off.

"What the hell!? Am I digging into some conspiracy theory territory or something? "

"No squirt, just—ugh, shut up for a second! And let go of my wrists, unless you want to lose yours!" We broke our holds on each other, both of us a little more than peeved at that moment. The knight turned her head towards the other room, listening to make sure Papyrus was still at his exercises.

"I'm still running, Undyne, no need to worry!" the skeleton called.

"Alright," Undyne said in a low voice, turning back to me and speaking through her teeth. "You want the honest answer?"

I scowled at her. "No, I'd rather you bullshit me and get nothing out of it. Yes, I want the honest answer!"

Her barred teeth slowly but surely receded. "Papyrus is a pretty freaking tough cookie, but…I'm not sure if…" She struggled to get the thought out, eyes falling towards the floor. A look of quiet concern washed over her features. "…I can _ever_ let Papyrus join the Royal Guard." She spoke softly, which a sort of affection I hadn't seen her use before, "Heh, the little dork's determined, that much is sure. I remember him showing up at my door one night, his cooking mitts clasped together against his breastplate, begging to join the Royal Guard with every fiber of his being. 'Course, I only had to look him up and down a single time before I slammed the door shut in his face. But the next morning, I looked out my window, and there he was…crumpled against the door. He hadn't moved a muscle, or slept a wink…"

It took me a moment to realize Undyne had drifted off her story, a sad smile on her lips. I had to shake my head to clear it. "You still haven't answered my question."

"…It's not that he's weak. It's never been that. He's just too innocent and nice for his own damn good." She thrust a finger towards my chest, almost as if to start another fight. Her frustration boiled to anger. "I mean, just look at what happened to you two! He was _supposed_ to capture you, and yet you guys ended up all buddy-buddy instead! I could never bring myself to send him into battle, otherwise…"

"…He'd be ripped into little smiling shreds," I finished for her, the realization suddenly hitting me like a brick wall. Papyrus needed quite a lot of encouragement from myself before he was ready for a scrap. I bit my lip anxiously, remembering my bitter harassment of his character, how I practically had to spit on his life goals, his most prized ambitions before he would even consider raising a bone against me. _You are like a goddamn leech, you know that?_

 _Reality check, Paps. You will_ never _be a member of the Royal Guard._

"Ah, shit…" I stared at Undyne, trying to make myself seem as sincere as possible. "Undyne, you can't just keep leading him on like this. I think…I think I agree with you, but the poor guy deserves to know." _Deserves to know that his dreams are futile, that he's been wasting all his time._

She nodded in agreement. "Believe me, I feel like shit doing this to him. That's why I started giving him cooking lessons in the first place," she explained. "I thought that, if I gave him something else to do besides train, he'd realize he wanted something different with his life. Now I'm not so sure I'm doing the right thing…"

"Hah, hah…Undyne, The Great Papyrus has completed his cardiovascular exercises!" came Papyrus's voice, rapidly approaching the kitchen.

"We'll finish this conversation later," she told me, not leaving a second to discuss it further.

"But—"

"—Well, I suppose my legs did not exactly fall from their sockets, but they certainly feel that way!" Papyrus came crawling back into the kitchen, dragging himself into the chair closest to me. "Ah, now where were we before my spontaneous physical exertions began?"

I strained myself not to feel guilty, meeting Papyrus's puppy-dog stare just inches from my face. "Pretty much nowhere." I coughed to ease some invisible substance out of my lungs, feeling needlessly claustrophobic in the tight space. "Uh…oh! Where's ole lazy bones been skulking around to lately?" I asked, recalling my need to talk with Sans about his disappearing acts. I hadn't laid eyes on the sneaky bastard since he vanished from Waterfall without a trace.

Undyne scoffed at my efforts. "For the love of the Delta Rune, please leave the damn puns to that fat little bowling pin, kid."

"Sorry."

"You mean Sans? Last my brother had informed me," Papyrus spoke up, "he was stationed in Hotland today on his civic guard duty that provides safety and security to all of the Underground. So he is probably asleep by his post."

"Hotland!" I nearly yelled, finally with something to be semi-excited bout. "Well, good thing I was on my way there already." I glanced at my nonexistent watch. "In fact, I should be getting lost around here pretty soon. Gotta get moving again before someone actually dangerous finds out I'm here."

I expected there to be some protest at my departure, but Undyne seemed almost elated. I wondered if she worried about me spilling the beans to Papyrus if I hung around any longer. "Yeah, you've got a good point there, kid," she agreed with no hesitation.

Paps, on the other hand, was shocked. "B-but human," he ventured, "think about all the slumber parties we could have with both you _and_ Undyne…staying…" Our collective glare of disapproval derailed his schemes. "Ahem. Very well. Before you go, human, I thought about what you suggested the last time you visited, and moved my spare bones from the shower and into the shed outside! So you may use that if you wish."

"Seriously?" I shot out of my seat, the idea of rinsing off my brutalized body almost tantalizing. "You actually used that noggin of yours for something, huh Paps? Thanks dude."

"You are most welcome," he said with a bow, which almost sent him sprawling out of his chair.

"And I'll be stuck here for a while, kid, so if you give Papyrus a call, we'll _both_ be waiting to hear from you," Undyne said. "If you every get into any trouble with some Royal Guardsman, ring me up and I'll deal with 'em. Got that?"

"Yes ma'am." I gave her a mock salute. "Now the only thing I have left to figure out is how the hell I'm gonna get through Waterfall without taking a goddamn eternity…" Undyne snickered at me, followed by a weirdly out of place chuckle. "What's so funny?"

"Don't worry about the walk. I know a guy who'll get you through to Hotland before you can say 'holy shit, I'm in Hotland!'"

I looked at her suspiciously. "Why does that not make me feel any better?"

"Because you actually have some common sense. Now get your ass upstairs. You stink like fish."


End file.
